The Effectiveness of Employing Communication Professionals in Media Institutions for Artificial Intelligence Technologies as a Powerful Tool to Combat Fake News: A Field Study

This field study highlights the effectiveness of employing communication professionals in media institutions for Artificial Intelligence (AI) technologies in combating fake news, amidst the profound transformations witnessed in the global media landscape and the exacerbation of the fake news phenomenon, which poses a threat to information credibility and societal stability. The study aims to explore the extent of communication professionals' awareness of these technologies, their usage patterns, and their effectiveness in detecting falsification, in addition to the challenges facing their optimal utilization. The study adopts a descriptive survey methodology and includes a purposive sample of 110 communication professionals in various Egyptian media institutions (news channels, electronic newspaper websites, news agencies), with data collected using an electronic questionnaire whose validity and reliability were proven.
The results showed that most communication professionals have "good" or "excellent" knowledge of AI, and their main sources of knowledge are training courses and educational YouTube videos, with increasing reliance on AI in their daily tasks, although it is still in its nascent stages. The study also revealed that a large percentage of respondents (over 61%) are exposed to fake news, and that Facebook and fake websites are the most prominent sources of its spread. The study further confirmed the effectiveness of AI in combating fake news, as the majority of respondents believe it is used to a great extent in this field, and there is general satisfaction with its use, along with increasing confidence in the credibility of AI-generated news. Statistical hypotheses also proved a strong and significant positive relationship between media institutions' use of AI technologies and the rate of combating fake news, the degree of diversity in technology use, and the credibility of news produced using these technologies.
The study recommends providing specialized and continuous training programs for communication professionals, enhancing technical infrastructure, integrating AI topics into academic curricula, developing regulatory and legislative frameworks, encouraging diversity in the use of technical applications, and achieving a balance between reliance on AI and human intervention.