TY - JOUR
T1 - Estimating cost of fighting against fake news during catastrophic situations
AU - Jo, Hanseul
AU - Park, Soyoung
AU - Shin, Dongcheol
AU - Shin, Jungwoo
AU - Lee, Changjun
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korean government (MSIT) (No. 2019R1F1A1058948).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Elsevier Ltd
PY - 2022/1
Y1 - 2022/1
N2 - As the battle with COVID-19 continues, an Infodemic problem has been raised. Even though the distribution of false news in national disaster situations has been reported for a long time, little attention has been given to the quantitative research of the fake news problem from the audience's perspective. This study, therefore, aims to estimate how much tax taxpayers would gladly pay for a virtual public-run fact-checking system. Using a one-and-one-half bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation method, a survey was conducted on 525 respondents in Korea, and the spike model was applied to distinguish zero willingness-to-pay (WTP). The results show that a household's WTP for the public fact-checking system is 10,652 KRW (9 USD), on average, in the form of income tax for five years. Given the amount is a regular payment in perpetuity, the total WTP is estimated at 23 billion KRW ($196 M) every year. The result also shows that an individual's WTP increases as his or her psychological damage caused by fake news is high, as well as his or her high reliance on news in a disaster situation.
AB - As the battle with COVID-19 continues, an Infodemic problem has been raised. Even though the distribution of false news in national disaster situations has been reported for a long time, little attention has been given to the quantitative research of the fake news problem from the audience's perspective. This study, therefore, aims to estimate how much tax taxpayers would gladly pay for a virtual public-run fact-checking system. Using a one-and-one-half bounded dichotomous choice contingent valuation method, a survey was conducted on 525 respondents in Korea, and the spike model was applied to distinguish zero willingness-to-pay (WTP). The results show that a household's WTP for the public fact-checking system is 10,652 KRW (9 USD), on average, in the form of income tax for five years. Given the amount is a regular payment in perpetuity, the total WTP is estimated at 23 billion KRW ($196 M) every year. The result also shows that an individual's WTP increases as his or her psychological damage caused by fake news is high, as well as his or her high reliance on news in a disaster situation.
KW - Contingent valuation
KW - Fake news
KW - Fake news policy
KW - National disaster situation
KW - National hazard
KW - Technological response in public
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85120939558&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.tele.2021.101734
DO - 10.1016/j.tele.2021.101734
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85120939558
SN - 0736-5853
VL - 66
JO - Telematics and Informatics
JF - Telematics and Informatics
M1 - 101734
ER -