Misinformation Through the Internet : Epistemology and Ethics

Because information on the Internet can be used as a basis for decisions, actions, and policies, the quality of the information on the Internet is a morally significant issue. In judging the reliability of information from traditional sources, people generally apply secondary epistemic criteria. These concern the perceived reliability of the sources of the information rather than the information itself. Application of these criteria is ultimately based on institutionally embedded systems that confer authority and credibility on organizations and persons. Often, the secondary criteria cannot easily be applied to information on the Internet. In this chapter, I explain why this is so, and I argue that this situation is serious enough to call for special ethical reflection. I suggest that there are two strategies for coming to terms with this problem. The first is to develop a critical attitude in the persons who use the Internet and to show them ways of critically assessing the quality of the information on the Internet. The second consists in a quest for new secondary criteria or for new ways of applying traditional secondary criteria. Implementing both of these strategies may, however, conflict with normative principles regarding the freedom to provide and to receive information, with privacy norms and with normative moral relativism.