This article discusses how Shosana Zuboff’s critical theory of surveillance capitalism may help to understand and underpin responsible practice and innovation in mobile journalism. Zuboff conceptualizes surveillance capitalism as a new economic logic made possible by ICT and its architecture for extracting and trading data products of user behavior and preferences. In Europe, the framework of responsible research and innovation is promoted as an approach that should inform practice and policy for research and innovation to align with societal values and democratic principles. While the adoption of smartphones as a key tool for producing and consuming news has great potential for innovation, it can also feed behavioral data into the supply chain of surveillance capitalism. The article discusses how potentially harmful implications can be met on an individual and organizational level to contribute to a more responsible adoption of mobile technologies in journalism.

Salzmann, Anja; Frode Guribye and Astrid Gynnild. 2021. “Mobile Journalists as Traceable Data Objects: Surveillance Capitalism and Responsible Innovation in Mobile Journalism” Media and Communication 9 (2) In press.

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The classic grounded theory of remote female fixation provides new knowledge on the illegal sharing of sexualized images of young girls in networked online communities. This sharing occurs without consent and usually without the girls knowing about it. The data were gathered from 20 different online comment sections of the Norwegian branch of a global, anonymous community with a reputation for extensive sharing of nude images of young women. It emerged from the data that the forum's users had an ongoing need to master their own female fixations, which they satisfied through the process of remote female fixation. In this process, forum users engaged in four interdependent strategies: continuous competing, loyal including, irregular rewarding,and tactical negotiating. By identifying the forum users' shared concern, this study may help explain the increasing presence of sexual abuse in digital environments.

Otteren, Hilde and Astrid Gynnild. 2021. “Remote Female Fixation—A Grounded Theory on Illegal Sharing of Nude Imagery Online” FQS: Forum Qualitative Social Research, 22 (2) in press.

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Synthetic media technologies are rapidly advancing, making it easier to generate nonveridical media that look and sound increasingly realistic. So-called "deepfakes" (owing to their reliance on deep learning) often present a person saying or doing something they have not said or done. The proliferation of deepfakes creates a new challenge to the trustworthiness of visual experience and has already created negative consequences such as nonconsensual pornography, political disinformation, and financial fraud. Deepfakes can harm viewers by deceiving or intimidating, harm subjects by causing reputational damage, and harm society by undermining societal values such as trust in institutions. What can be done to mitigate these harms? It will take the efforts of many different stakeholders including platforms, journalists, and policymakers to counteract the negative effects of deepfakes. Technical experts can and should play an active role, the authors point out.

Johnson, Deborah G. and Nicholas Diakopoulos. 2021. “Communications of the ACM” 64 (3), 33-35 DOI: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3447255

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