Electronic rumors on social media During the emerging Corona virus pandemic

Abstract

The study has aimed to recognize the content of rumors which have spread on social media due to the emerging (COVID 19) during the period from March 2020 and up to July 2020. The study used the descriptive approach "content analysis" to describe and analyze the content of rumors to clarify their types and forms and the purpose of spreading them among people. The study society is composed of all rumors made about the emerging coronavirus pandemic in the account of the Rumors Control Authority on Twitter application. Quantitative inventory has been made for those rumors and their content was analyzed, and several results have been found out. The most important results reached by this work are that the highest rate of spread of rumors was in March; the month when the World Health Organization announced that the Coronavirus is a pandemic because it is spreading worldwide, and the number of rumors that have spread in the authority account in Twitter during that period was (61 ). Rumors of intimidation and spreading fear and panic among people were at the top of the kinds of rumors as the content of the rumors involved extremely frightening and misguiding news through the use of different forms of publication on social media. In the second position, we find the accusative and offensive rumors made against persons in the leading positions and the official groups and organizations to distort their reputation and make the public lose confidence and trust them. In the third place come the unrealistic and dreamy rumors, and then the rumors of hatred and racism. The study also revealed some of the procedures taken by the countries as general and Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in particular to fight the rumors and false information to control and stop their spread among the people during the disaster that the world has been encountering due to the spread of the emerging coronavirus pandemic. One of these procedures is the declaration made by the Public Prosecution that fabrication and spread of rumors is a crime punishable with a five-year improvement and monetary fine.