My Father is almost 70 years old and new to using the internet. I set him up with a new computer and an email address in December. Thankfully, he is finally maneuvering his way through the digital world and taking it slow. I called him this week, and I let him know that I wanted to share a few things with him that I had learned in my ASU Digital Media Literacy class. I explained to him that fake news exists and that the internet has several different methods of how fake news spreads.
“Future Home Computer” by izenman is licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0
After explaining the definitions of trolls, bots, and what micro-targeting is, he had several questions. We then proceeded to spend quite a bit of time discussing how fake news is spread. He had a hard time understanding that robots are aiding in the spread of fake news. Once he understood the different ways that false news spreads, I then explained the importance of him researching the news and the articles that he reads before he shares them on his social media accounts. I explained that Snopes was an excellent source to reference when fact-checking, and I also explained how to do a reverse image search as well. He had no idea that this existed, so this was very exciting to him.
I then explained that websites install “cookies” on your computer as a way of analyzing and collecting information about you to use for personalized advertising. I had him read, “How to View Cookies in Your Computer.” He had a hard time understanding how this worked, so I had him read the article, “What are cookies doing to your computer?” I then made sure that he understood how to delete cookies from his computer and had him read, “How to clear cookies in Chrome, Firefox, Safari, and other browsers.” This information helped him understand what cookies were and how to remove them.
“160411-224” by waferboard is licensed under CC BY 2.0
After he understood all of the technological information, I then let him know that using common sense before he shared an article and taking the time to ask himself a few questions before sharing the information was necessary. I let him know that he should always ask: Where did this information come from? Is the source reputable and trustworthy? What is the timeline for this? Is it recent? I also had him read, “How to Spot Fake news.” This article was beneficial and made him understand how important it is not to spread false information.
At the end of our conversation, my Father was very appreciative that I had shared this information with him. He was so excited that he started pulling up articles on Facebook and fact-checking them on Snopes and Factcheck.org. I am thankful that I completed this assignment with my Father, as it was a conversation that needed to be had. In the end, hopefully, this conversation will prevent one more person from spreading false information.
