The Irony of the Flood of Public Information

KOMPAS/HERU SRI KUMORO

A pedestrian looks at antihoax campaign murals under the Rawa Buntu overpass in Serpong, South Tangerang, on Monday (11/3/2019).

For the public, the flood of information on various media forms right now is at a bad level. The public believes the flood of information brings various impacts, including rising potential for division in society.

This flood of information has become ironic. On one hand, the public benefits from information that circulates quickly at a low cost and is easily obtained. However, on the other hand, the flood of information brings negative impacts and social segregation.

This societal saturation with excessive information is shown by the results of a recent Kompas survey. Only a third of respondents felt they were not saturated with information, the remaining felt otherwise. This indicates that the mass distribution of information content as a result of technological advancement has not been followed by digital literacy readiness.

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Hoax is defined in the Oxford English Dictionary as a form of deception that aims to make humor or bring harm. Hoaks in Indonesian dictionaries means fake news, false information or false news. Walsh in his 2006 book, Sins Against Science, The Scientific Media Hoaxes of Poe, Twain and Others, mentions that the term hoax has existed since 1800, the beginning of the industrial revolution in England.

Data from the Communications and Information Ministry from Aug. 1, 2018, to June 22 of this year shows that 8,499 hoaxes have been officially recorded. According to the data, the hoaxes have been principally related to politics (1,252 hoaxes), the government (1,702) and health (1,719). Especially for health, the majority of hoaxes have related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

KOMPAS/TATANG MULYANA SINAGA

Young people join the Bandung Anti Hoaks (Bandung Against Hoaxes) declaration organized by the Indonesian Anti-Libel Society (Mafindo) during Car Free Day on Jl. Ir Djuanda, Bandung, West Java, on March 31, 2019 (31/3/2019).

The public has revealed that the hoaxes circulating are now worrying. This fact was found in this survey, where 41.6 percent said they were very worried and 42.3 said they were quite worried.

If we trace the sources of the information, the public sees social media and online sites as the biggest contributors to hoaxes. The public considers hoax content on social media already at a severe level. In fact, 35.3 percent of respondents said hoax content on social media was very severe and 41.5 percent said it was quite severe.

For the public, the current flood of information has the potential to cause social segregation or division in society based on ethnicity, religion, race and group (SARA), then based on socioeconomic class, as well as based on politics, ideology and parties.

This condition is related to the digital literacy of the community. The Digital Literacy Survey by the Communication and Information Ministry in 2020 in 34 provinces, involving 1,670 respondents, showed that Indonesia\'s digital literacy score was 3.47 out of a total of 5. This figure is in the medium category. The indicators studied were information and data literacy, communication and collaboration, as well as security and technological capability.

In the midst of the flood of information, some respondents stated that they still got the substance of their information from the media (48 percent), some said the flood of information made them confused (41 percent) and 9 percent said this phenomenon created uncertainty.

The public is more satisfied with the accuracy of information from mainstream media such as newspapers and television (72 percent) than information from social media.

The level of public satisfaction with the accuracy of the information is also illustrated in the survey. The public is more satisfied with the accuracy of information from mainstream media such as newspapers and television (72 percent) than information from social media.

Kompas/Wisnu Widiantoro

Two girls pose during an information dissemination event declaring the Indonesian Anti-Hoax Community during car-free day in Jakarta, Sunday (8/1/2019). The objective of the declaration, which also took place five other cities in Indonesia, is to clean social media of false news and hoaxes.

Dissatisfaction with the accuracy of social media is at 39.9 percent, while towards mainstream media it was recorded at 20 percent.

This is understandable, because the process of producing news through the mainstream media is quite long. For newspaper institutions, for example, the news production process starts from determining the theme of coverage and continues to determining sources, field reporting, news writing, content and language editing and publishing.

Control efforts

There are three stakeholders who, according to the public, are responsible for controlling the flood of information, namely the government as a regulator (39 percent), media institutions as news producers (24.9 percent) and society as the market (25.2 percent).

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The Communication and Information Ministry has created Aduan Konten (Content Complaints), a website for the public to submit complaints about hoaxes. Through this website, everyone may complain about negative content by registering, uploading links to and screenshots of content reported, along with the reasons for the report. The public can also monitor the handling process by the ministry’s team.

The public\'s reasoning regarding why the flood of information needed to be "controlled" was to make the public calmer (57.4 percent). In addition, the flood of information was also considered to have the potential to threaten or endanger the state (32 percent).

AP PHOTO/DAMIAN DOVARGANES

California Supervisor Hilda Solis, at podium, holds a "Fake" letter circulating in Facebook, as she joins a news conference on Coronavirus with California and local health officials in San Gabriel, Calif., Friday, Jan. 31, 2020, as the outbreak reaches Southern California. At left, Assemblymember Ed Chau, and Dr. Munto Davis, MD, MPH, Los Angeles County Department of Public Health, right. A fake letter circulating on Facebook, and through emails, claims that the City of Carson, Calif., is experiencing a coronavirus outbreak, and that is false. This letter is a hoax, according to Solis. (AP Photo/Damian Dovarganes)

The public believes the control of information by the government must be different from the information control under the New Order. The context is not to curb the freedom of information or the freedom of the press but to control false information, which has the effect of deceiving and destroying the social order. (KOMPAS R&D)

(This article was translated by Kurniawan Siswoko).