Digital Deception

Jeff Should Write The New Wikipedia Article For Deception

Assignment 7 Option 3

For the purposes of this assignment, I consulted our course syllabus. In my mind, if someone wants to learn about digital deception he/she should first understand lies and deception in general, and then apply it to knowledge about CMC. Unfortunately, Wikipedia is a poor source to gain any general notion about any of these topics. Really the only content worth reading is the disclaimer--"Some information in this article or section has not been verified and may not be reliable. Please check for any inaccuracies, and modify and cite sources as needed."
If I were taking on the arduous task of updating the Wiki site or creating a new one purely for digital deception, I'd probably outline it a bit like this:
1. Definition of truth, lie, and deception
2. Description of the varying natures of truths and lies
3. Brief overview of media and CMC
4. Comparison of verbal and non-verbal cues to deception
4. Outline of different types of online deception (Rowe)
5. Discussion of prevalence of lies and deception in everyday life
6. What is motivation and how does it impact lying behavior?
7. Insights on identity deception online, including in chat rooms and profiles
8. Description of phishing and other frauds
9. How to detect deception

I think all of these aspects are important, because without any preceding understanding of each topic, it's difficult to harness a broad scope of deception.
As the site is now, readers have some weak examples of deception (just # 4 in my anatomy of a better article). Interestingly, the phishing article is really well-done, and truth isn't bad but highly philosophical, so feasibly we could latch on and beef up the CMC related material and make some serious improvement.

posted by Jenna @ 12:50 AM