Dynamics of COVID-19 Misinformation: An Analysis of Conspiracy Theories, Fake Remedies, and False Reports

This paper makes four scientific contributions to the area of misinformation detection and analysis on digital platforms, with a specific focus on investigating how conspiracy theories, fake remedies, and false reports emerge, propagate, and shape public perceptions in the context of COVID-19. A dataset of 5,614 posts on the internet that contained misinformation about COVID-19 was used for this study. These posts were published in 2020 on 427 online sources (such as social media platforms, news channels, and online blogs) from 193 countries and in 49 languages. First, this paper presents a structured, three-tier analytical framework that investigates how multiple motives - including fear, politics, and profit - can lead to a misleading claim. Second, it emphasizes the importance of narrative structures, systematically identifying and quantifying the thematic elements that drive conspiracy theories, fake remedies, and false reports. Third, it presents a comprehensive analysis of different sources of misinformation, highlighting the varied roles played by individuals, state-based organizations, media outlets, and other sources. Finally, it discusses multiple potential implications of these findings for public policy and health communication, illustrating how insights gained from motive, narrative, and source analyses can guide more targeted interventions in the context of misinformation detection on digital platforms.