Talk:Computational propaganda

This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 15 January 2025 and 6 May 2025. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): ConvertibleFlyingSaucer (article contribs). Peer reviewers: Shadow-Rainger, Rbdota23.

— Assignment last updated by GardenMoth25 (talk) 18:05, 16 April 2025 (UTC)

Hi, I wanted to leave a comment here about updating this article. I have made a draft in my sandbox, and plan to add the following sections: A "Mechanisms" section centered on the tools that computational propaganda is characterized by; a "Multidisciplinary studies" section that talks about how such an approach has been proposed to tackle this phenomenon; a "Spread" section detailing how Computational Propaganda has become more commonplace in different countries, a "Regulation" section that speaks on efforts of mitigating Computational Propaganda, and lastly, a "Detection" section which would detail a growing literature on efforts against Computational Propaganda. I then would also modify the Lead to include some details and extend it to include an overview of the new sections. Thanks! --ConvertibleFlyingSaucer (talk) 23:05, 8 April 2025 (UTC)

@ConvertibleFlyingSaucer: In Wikipedia talk page new sectiona are added at the bottom, not the top. --Altenmann >talk 00:18, 9 April 2025 (UTC)

Hi Altenmann, I have re-written several aspects of the article in my sandbox as you had specified. Sorry about the bold lettering, it was more so for peer reviewers to be able to tell which segments were added in-between the old text. I have addressed the frequent citation to avoid unintentional synthesis. --ConvertibleFlyingSaucer (talk) 05:03, 30 April 2025 (UTC)

The user below has a request that an edit be made to Computational propaganda. That user has an actual or apparent conflict of interest. The requested edits backlog is very high. Please be extremely patient. There are currently 647 requests waiting for review. Please read the instructions for the parameters used by this template for accepting and declining them, and review the request below and make the edit if it is well sourced, neutral, and follows other Wikipedia guidelines and policies.

I have a conflict of interest here and am requesting rather than making this edit.

The issue: The article carries the banner {{Missing information|the role of memes, and artificial intelligence in modern propaganda, including generative AI, deepfakes, synthetic AI media, and AI-powered social media bots|date=May 2026}}, placed in May 2026. The body still matches what the tag describes: the words "generative", "deepfake", "large language model" and "synthetic media" do not appear anywhere in the article outside the banner itself, and the techniques the body sets out are bot accounts, coordination, algorithmic amplification and the detection of both. The addition below answers one part of the tag, the generative-AI part, and does not answer the memes part, so the tag should stay in place after the edit.

Proposed change: Add one sentence at the end of the second paragraph of the lead section, immediately after the sentence ending "...circumvent rational thinking and promote specific ideas." and its reference:

Since the wide release of generative artificial intelligence systems, researchers have described the use of large language models and related generative tools to produce propaganda material at scale, including synthetic text and deepfake images, audio and video.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Ferrara |first1=Emilio |year=2024 |title=GenAI against humanity: nefarious applications of generative artificial intelligence and large language models |journal=Journal of Computational Social Science |volume=7 |issue=1 |pages=549–569 |doi=10.1007/s42001-024-00250-1}}</ref>

Source: Ferrara, Emilio (2024). "GenAI against humanity: nefarious applications of generative artificial intelligence and large language models". Journal of Computational Social Science 7(1): 549–569. doi:10.1007/s42001-024-00250-1. It is a survey of misuse categories rather than a measurement study, so it supports the existence and description of these techniques, not any claim about how prevalent they are.

Disclosure: This citation is to my own work (Ferrara, sole author). See User:Emilio Ferrara.

Happy for this to be declined or reworded; I will not make the edit myself. Emilio Ferrara (talk) 04:53, 27 July 2026 (UTC)