Check News in One Click: NLP-Empowered Pro-Kremlin Propaganda Detection
This addresses the challenge of propaganda targeting European citizens to undermine support for Ukraine, though it is incremental as it applies existing NLP methods to a new domain.
The researchers tackled the problem of detecting pro-Kremlin propaganda in news by developing an NLP-based application that provides feedback and explanations to users in 7 languages, resulting in a user study that analyzed model behavior and user interactions to evaluate the interpretative solution.
Many European citizens become targets of the Kremlin propaganda campaigns, aiming to minimise public support for Ukraine, foster a climate of mistrust and disunity, and shape elections (Meister, 2022). To address this challenge, we developed ''Check News in 1 Click'', the first NLP-empowered pro-Kremlin propaganda detection application available in 7 languages, which provides the lay user with feedback on their news, and explains manipulative linguistic features and keywords. We conducted a user study, analysed user entries and models' behaviour paired with questionnaire answers, and investigated the advantages and disadvantages of the proposed interpretative solution.