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Tim Hwang

Discussion around ﬁnancial incentives for disinformation has not been
limited to discussing the outlets producing and promoting this content online.
Since many of the most prominent online platforms such as Google and
Facebook are themselves reliant on advertising, critics and researchers have
also underscored that the companies hosting this activity may have perverse
incentives to harbor it, given that disinformation content is often widely shared
and viewed (Allcott and Gentzkow 2017; Thompson 2017). For their part,
these platforms have disputed this notion in numerous public statements and
have taken action to restrict distributing advertising against disinformation
(Wingﬁeld, Isaac and Benner 2016; Ling 2017).

“Trolling Culture” As a Disinformation Source
Social_Media_and_Democracy