Protecting the Vulnerable: Child Safety and Misinformation in the Digital Age

Abstract: In today’s digital landscape, online platforms pose significant challenges, particularly regarding child safety and misinformation. In this talk, I will explore two critical issues: children’s exposure to inappropriate advertising on YouTube and the effectiveness of media literacy interventions against political misinformation and deepfakes. First, I will share findings from a comparative study on advertisement exposure in child-oriented YouTube videos across ten countries. Our analysis reveals that a child’s YouTube experience is significantly shaped by their environment, revealing important gaps in how platforms enforce policies and protect children. Second, I will share findings from a randomized experiment that evaluated four media literacy interventions designed to counter misinformation. These interventions include accuracy nudges, tips for spotting fake news, psychological inoculation, and teaching people how to use a fact-checking service. Our findings show that while some interventions improve people’s ability to discern the truth, others may increase skepticism even towards accurate information. By exploring these challenges, this talk provides evidence-based insights for creating safer digital environments for children and finding effective strategies for building societal resilience against misinformation.

Bio: Dr. Ihsan Ayyub Qazi is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) and a Principal Investigator at the National Center in Big Data & Cloud Computing. He served as Chair of the LUMS Computer Science Department from 2018-2021, and was a visiting Research Scientist at the University of California at Berkeley in 2017. Dr. Qazi is a recipient of several prestigious awards including the Google Faculty Research Award, three Meta/Facebook Integrity Foundational Research Awards, ACM SIGCOMM CCR Best Paper Award, Google exploreCSR Award, and the Sheth International Young Alumni Achievement Award 2021 from the University of Pittsburgh, USA, where he earned his Ph.D. in Computer Science. His current research centers on networked systems and their societal impacts, with an emphasis on digital development, countering misinformation, and enhancing online privacy. (Web: http://web.lums.edu.pk/~ihsan/)

Website: https://www.ihsanqazi.com/