Merkel explained during an interview that there is enough evidence to prove that online public opinion has been “manipulated” by fake news and bots. This is a red flag for all of us and according to the chancellor, lawmakers must “confront this phenomenon and if necessary, regulate it”. “Something has changed – Opinions aren’t formed the way they were 25 years ago, as globalization has marched on, debate is taking place in a completely new media environment.” Merkel said.
After this month’s presidential elections, Donald Trump’s victory has caused the Internet to debate over whether fake news played here a role here or not. Some critics even went so far as to say that social networking platforms Facebook and Twitter should take more drastic measures against misinformation on their platforms. German officials have strongly criticized the American for-profit corporation and on-line social media and social networking service Facebook for failing to police hate speech on its platform over the past year. Google and Facebook have however recently announced that they will exclude fake news stories from their advertisement networks.
