Cyber-security, Privacy, Legal and Ethical Issues in IS
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Paper Type
Complete
Paper Number
2355
Description
Disinformation through social media has emerged as a new form of cyberweapon for countries to advance their strategic interests. However, there is a conspicuous dearth of studies that looked into the possible impacts of foreign disinformation attacks in a country. Drawing on the media dependency theory, we seek to explore the relationships among the foreign disinformation through social media, societal polarization, government’s cybersecurity capability, and the rule of law in a country. A quantitative analysis based on publicly available archival data substantiates our research model. The key contributions of this research include (1) adapting the media dependency theory to the context of social media in investigating the phenomenon of disinformation; (2) establishing that foreign disinformation through social media increases societal polarization, and reduces the rule of law in a country; and (3) establishing the vital role of government in mitigating the information operations from hostile foreign entities.
Recommended Citation
Arayankalam, Jithesh, "Disinformation as a strategic weapon: Roles of societal polarization, government’s cybersecurity capability, and the rule of law" (2020). ICIS 2020 Proceedings. 12.
https://aisel.aisnet.org/icis2020/cyber_security_privacy/cyber_security_privacy/12
Disinformation as a strategic weapon: Roles of societal polarization, government’s cybersecurity capability, and the rule of law
Disinformation through social media has emerged as a new form of cyberweapon for countries to advance their strategic interests. However, there is a conspicuous dearth of studies that looked into the possible impacts of foreign disinformation attacks in a country. Drawing on the media dependency theory, we seek to explore the relationships among the foreign disinformation through social media, societal polarization, government’s cybersecurity capability, and the rule of law in a country. A quantitative analysis based on publicly available archival data substantiates our research model. The key contributions of this research include (1) adapting the media dependency theory to the context of social media in investigating the phenomenon of disinformation; (2) establishing that foreign disinformation through social media increases societal polarization, and reduces the rule of law in a country; and (3) establishing the vital role of government in mitigating the information operations from hostile foreign entities.
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