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Conspiracy Theories Dissemination on SNS Vkontakte: COVID-19 Case

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Electronic Governance and Open Society: Challenges in Eurasia (EGOSE 2020)

Part of the book series: Communications in Computer and Information Science ((CCIS,volume 1349))

Abstract

COVID-19 crisis has caused the growth of popularity of conspiracy theories disseminated by opinion leaders as well as anonymous actors via social media. This trend poses a danger because supporters of fake agendas contribute to spreading disinformation, deny the real risks, break the rules, and even undertake some unlawful actions. Since March 2020 Russian Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor) initiated blocking fake news about coronavirus on social media but some of them remained available to the public. In our study, we considered the agenda on conspiracy theories presented in the posts on the most popular Russian SNS VKontakte. The initial database contained 2342689 posts published between March 30 and May 12, 2020.

After the interpretation of the results of topic modeling, we found that conspiracy-related posts comprised a small share among all popular COVID-related posts on VKontakte. Content analysis showed that only about a half of the posts with information on conspiracy theories about COVID-19 was devoted to the promotion of conspiracy arguments but the sufficient share related to the debate on alternative versions or criticism. It was revealed that the most popular theory presented in posts on Vkontakte can be described as “anti-vax/politicized” version of “the chipping theory” which found the link between coronavirus and “planned chipping” of population via “mass vaccination”.

The structure of the agenda on COVID-related conspiracy theories is described. The key features of the analyzed agenda on conspiracy theories and practical applications are discussed.

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Acknowledgement

We would like to thank our colleagues from the Center for Sociological and Internet Research of Saint Petersburg State University for guidance and support.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Sociological and Internet Research, Saint Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Konstantin Platonov

  2. Laboratory for Research of Social-Economic and Political Processes of Modern Society, Saint Petersburg State University, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Kirill Svetlov

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  1. Konstantin Platonov
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Konstantin Platonov .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. eGovernance Center, ITMO University, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Andrei Chugunov

  2. North-West Institute of Management, Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration (RANEPA), St. Petersburg, Russia

    Igor Khodachek

  3. eGovernance Center, ITMO University, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Yuri Misnikov

  4. eGovernance Center, ITMO University, St. Petersburg, Russia

    Dmitrii Trutnev

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Platonov, K., Svetlov, K. (2020). Conspiracy Theories Dissemination on SNS Vkontakte: COVID-19 Case. In: Chugunov, A., Khodachek, I., Misnikov, Y., Trutnev, D. (eds) Electronic Governance and Open Society: Challenges in Eurasia. EGOSE 2020. Communications in Computer and Information Science, vol 1349. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67238-6_23

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-67238-6_23

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-67238-6

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