Disinformation Governance Board to combat “misinformation” as a function of the Department of Homeland Security.
QUICK FACTS:
- Nina Jankowicz, the director of the Disinformation Governance Board for the Department of Homeland Security, previously compared freedom of speech to “fairy dust.”
- Janowicz made her comments while testifying before the United Kingdon’s House of Parliament during consideration of their online safety bill in the fall of 2021.
- During the testimony, Jankowicz said that she believes the government should set minimum speech standards that ban “misogyny” and blasted social media platforms that support “freedom of expression and fairy dust.”
JANKOWICZ’S TESTIMONY ON FREEDOM OF SPEECH:
- During her address to Parliament in the UK, the United States’ new head of the Disinformation Governance Board said that government-connected communications regulators should “be able to establish the minimum standards that would be applied to all platforms and incur fines.”
- In the U.S., the government-connected communications agency would be the Federal Communications Commission, which governs public speech in multiple sectors.
- The “disinformation czar” indicated how social media platforms can be forced to participate in speech regulation, saying “social media platforms can do that if they are compelled to.”
BACKGROUND:
- The choice of Jankowicz for the head of the disinformation department was blasted by conservatives because of previous comments on her social media, including her citation of Christopher Steele as an expert in the field of disinformation.
- Jankowicz also previously demanded that “trustworthy verified people” be given the power to edit other people’s tweets, to make Twitter’s experience closer to that of Wikipedia.
