Podcast: Facebook Makes a Stand. But can Fake News be stopped?

This article summarizes an interview with researcher Kate Starbird on the rise and persistence of online conspiracy theories and "alternative narrative" rumors: how they spread with long-tailed patterns, share a common lexicon and citation networks (including nationalist and pro-Russian sites), and how counter-evidence is often absorbed into broader conspiratorial narratives, making them difficult to eradicate and an important subject for further research and policy consideration.