Davey Alba

Last updated
Davey Alba
Education De La Salle University (BA)
Columbia University (MA)
OccupationTechnology journalism
Website daveyalba.com

Davey Alba is a technology reporter who covers Big Tech for Bloomberg News, [1] after previously reporting on online disinformation for The New York Times . [2]

Contents

Early life and education

Davey Alba was born in Manila, Philippines, and attended De La Salle University, earning a degree in communication arts. Her father is an academic, mother an economic consultant and her sister is VP of a multi-national investment bank. She came to the United States at age 23 [3] in 2011. She studied at Columbia University and received a masters in science journalism. [2]

Career

Alba's first job out of training was at Popular Mechanics ; she was technology editor and got to test gadgets and phones. [4] She worked as a technology reporter at BuzzFeed News , Wired and Gizmodo before joining The New York Times as a technology reporter in 2019. [2] Her area of coverage was "disinformation and all of its tentacles." [5] In March, 2022, she joined Bloomberg News, covering Google and Big Tech. [1]

In 2018, working at BuzzFeed News, she reported how Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte used Facebook to gain power in the country. [6] For the BuzzFeed News article on Duterte, Alba won two 2019 awards. She was awarded the Livingston Award for International Reporting, documenting how Facebook ignored fake news, fueled the Filipino drug war, [7] and adversely impacted a vulnerable community [3] by enabling Duterte to manipulate public opinion and win election. [8] After Duterte won, the Facebook machinery of manipulating opinion became a state-sponsored one [6] "to punish opponents, sometimes with death." [7] She won the Mirror Award for Best Story for Journalism in Peril. [9]

After reporting on videos supportive of President Trump's recommendation for the use disinfectants in the treatment of COVID-19, [10] Davey was the target of "weaponized harassment." Davey reports that she was targeted as a reporter who is an immigrant, a woman and a person of color. [11]

In September 2021, Alba interviewed incoming Wikimedia Foundation chief executive officer Maryana Iskander. [12]

Related Research Articles

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<i>The Epoch Times</i> Far-right media company affiliated with Falun Gong

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Maria Ressa</span> Filipino and American journalist (born 1963)

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The Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) is a British non-profit organisation with offices in London and Washington, DC. It campaigns for big tech firms to stop providing services to individuals who may promote hate and misinformation, including neo-Nazis and anti-vaccine advocates, and campaigns to restrict media organisations such as The Daily Wire from advertising. CCDH is a member of the Stop Hate For Profit coalition.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Institute for Strategic Dialogue</span> Think tank

The Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) is a political advocacy organization founded in 2006 by Sasha Havlicek and George Weidenfeld and headquartered in London, United Kingdom.

MintPress News (MPN) is an American far-left news website founded and edited by Mnar Adley which was launched in January 2012 and also publishes the MintCast podcast. It covers political, economic, foreign affairs and environmental issues. Editorially, MintPress News supports Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, and the governments of Russia, Iran, and Syria. It opposes the governments of Israel and Saudi Arabia, and reports geopolitical events from an anti-Western perspective. In one contentious article, MintPress News falsely asserted that the Ghouta chemical attack in Syria was perpetrated by rebel groups rather than by the Syrian government.

State-sponsored Internet propaganda is Internet manipulation and propaganda that is sponsored by a state.

Fake news websites are websites on the Internet that deliberately publish fake news—hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation purporting to be real news—often using social media to drive web traffic and amplify their effect. Unlike news satire, fake news websites deliberately seek to be perceived as legitimate and taken at face value, often for financial or political gain. Such sites have promoted political falsehoods in India, Germany, Indonesia and the Philippines, Sweden, Mexico, Myanmar, and the United States. Many sites originate in, or are promoted by, Russia, North Macedonia, and Romania, among others. Some media analysts have seen them as a threat to democracy. In 2016, the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs passed a resolution warning that the Russian government was using "pseudo-news agencies" and Internet trolls as disinformation propaganda to weaken confidence in democratic values.

A troll farm or troll factory is an institutionalised group of internet trolls that seeks to interfere in political opinions and decision-making.

Fake news websites target United States audiences by using disinformation to create or inflame controversial topics such as the 2016 election. Most fake news websites target readers by impersonating or pretending to be real news organizations, which can lead to legitimate news organizations further spreading their message. Most notable in the media are the many websites that made completely false claims about political candidates such as Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump, as part of a larger campaign to gain viewers and ad revenue or spread disinformation. Additionally, satire websites have received criticism for not properly notifying readers that they are publishing false or satirical content, since many readers have been duped by seemingly legitimate articles.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fake news</span> False or misleading information presented as real

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Vera Files is a non-profit online news organization in the Philippines, known for its institutionalized role in fact-checking false information in the Philippines, and as one of the news organizations most prominently targeted by intimidation and censorship due to its critical coverage of the Philippine government. It is part of the International Fact-Checking Network of the Poynter Institute and is one of Facebook's two Philippine partners in its third-party fact-checking program.

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Fake news in the Philippines refers to the general and widespread misinformation or disinformation in the country by various actors. It has been problematic in the Philippines where social media and alike plays a key role in influencing topics and information ranging from politics, health, belief, religion, current events, aid, lifestyle, elections and others. Recently, it has evolved to be a rampant issue against the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines and the 2022 Philippine general election.

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Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic in the Philippines consists of disinformation about the COVID-19 pandemic propagated by various sources.

Julia Carrie Wong is a journalist primarily reporting on labor, tech and extremism, currently for The Guardian. Her reporting on Facebook and its involvement in disinformation and misinformation campaigns that artificially promoted candidates in Azerbaijan and Honduras has raised awareness of Facebook's content management controversies, as has her reporting on the company's similar failure to act on white supremacist groups on Facebook.

References

  1. 1 2 Roush, Chris (2022-03-23). "Bloomberg hires Alba from NY Times to cover Google, Big Tech". Talking Biz News. Retrieved 2022-09-27.
  2. 1 2 3 "Meet Our New Tech Reporter: Davey Alba". The New York Times Company. 2019-07-19. Retrieved 2020-08-14.
  3. 1 2 "This Pinay Is The New York Times' New Tech Reporter". Metro.Style. Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  4. ↑ "Davey Alba, M.A. Program Alumna, Wins 2019 Livingston and Mirror Awards". apply.jrn.columbia.edu. Retrieved 2020-08-14.
  5. ↑ Bureau, INQUIRER net US (2019-07-25). "New York Times hires Filipina technology reporter". INQUIRER.net USA. Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  6. 1 2 "Duterte's Drug War And The Human Cost Of Facebook's Rise In The Philippines". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved 2020-08-14.
  7. 1 2 "2019 Livingston Winners Announced". Wallace House. 2019-06-04. Retrieved 2020-08-15.
  8. ↑ "Duterte's Facebook-Fueled Rise to Power: Manipulating Public Opinion to Capture an Election". The Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. 2019-11-19. Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  9. ↑ "Past Winners". Mirror Awards | Newhouse School at Syracuse University. Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  10. ↑ Frenkel, Sheera; Alba, Davey (2020-04-30). "Trump's Disinfectant Talk Trips Up Sites' Vows Against Misinformation". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  11. ↑ "NY Times reporter Davey Alba on covering COVID-19 conspiracy theories, facing online harassment". Committee to Protect Journalists. 2020-05-21. Retrieved 2020-08-16.
  12. ↑ Alba, Davey (2021-09-23). "Wikipedia's next leader on preventing misinformation: 'Neutrality requires understanding.'". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2021-09-23.
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