EU project to build lie detector for social media called PHEME. The aim is to develop automatic methods to help people (journalists, health professionals, patients, governments) assess the truthfulness of information that is spreading through social networks and other online media.
Social networks have been used to spread accusations of vote-rigging in Kenyan elections, allege that Barack Obama was Muslim and claim that the animals were set free from London Zoo during the 2011 riots.
But once the algorithm is perfected for sorting fact from fiction, will academics turn their hand to clearing out all the other rubbish?
Named Pheme after a Greek mythological figure who "pried into the affairs of mortals and gods, then repeated what she learned, starting off at first with just a dull whisper, but repeating it louder each time, until everyone knew," the system will collate a variety of data to assess in real time how likely it really is that a baby mermaid was just born in the Philippines or snakes invaded a Pennsylvania casino…
Pheme will cost an estimated $5.8 million and evolve over the course of three years, being tested during that time both by the online arm of the University of Sheffield, Kings College London and University of Warwick in England; Saarland University in Germany; swissinfo.ch in Switzerland; Ontotext in Bulgaria; ATOS Spain SAU in Spain; Ushahidi in Kenya; and MODUL University Vienna in Austria.
I suppose the world's security services will be connected and influencing the results, or is this a lie Morpheus?
