Contextual Factors of Online Deception and Harmful Information
Kristjan Kikerpill, Elisabeth Carter, Marju Himma-Kadakas, Sten Hansson · 2024
Online deviance takes many forms, and its frequent compartmentalisation within different disciplines offers the impression of infinite variations of deceptions. However, this conceals commonalities and narrows possibilities for overarching understandings of deception and ways to prevent these forms of deviance. This chapter provides perspectives from criminology, sociology, forensic linguistics, and communication studies, delivering conceptual clarity to the study of online deviance. We systematise and compare terminology and expose the practical manifestations and conceptual understandings of lies, unintentional misleading, and even the malicious use of truth. The primary vehicle for any harmful communication online is the exchange of context-dependent messages, which are enveloped in contextual factors on the individual, situational, and social-structural level. Examining the dissemination of false information in criminal and non-criminal communications, we explore case studies of social engineering attacks, frauds and scams, exposure to false information in the context of crises and disasters, and of the dissemination of mis- and disinformation in journalism. This multidisciplinary collaborative work illustrates the range of mechanisms by which individual, social-structural, and situational factors influence the ways in which people formulate, engage with, and are affected by potentially harmful messages.