Berners-Lee Cites Data Collection, Spread of 'Fake News' as Top 'Challenges" for Internet

humanity.” Websites’ collection of personal data means “we lose out on the benefits we could realise if we had direct control over this data, and chose when and with whom to share it,” Berners-Lee said Sunday in a WWWF blog post on the 28th anniversary of his proposal for the World Wide Web. “We often do not have any way of feeding back to companies what data we’d rather not share.” Widespread data collection prompted more government intrusion online, which “creates a chilling effect on free speech and stops the web from being used as a space to explore important topics, like sensitive health issues, sexuality or religion,” Berners-Lee said. He urged stakeholders to resist the spread of “fake news” misinformation. Internet users’ increasing reliance on Facebook and other social media platforms that use algorithms to decide how to prioritize the placement of news means “those with bad intentions can game the system to spread misinformation for financial or political gain,” Berners-Lee said. The spread of political advertising on Facebook and other websites is also concerning, he said. “There are suggestions that some political adverts -- in the [U.S.] and around the world -- are being used in unethical ways,” including “to point voters to fake news sites, for instance, or to keep others away from the polls,” Berners-Lee said. “Targeted advertising allows a campaign to say completely different, possibly conflicting things to different groups. Is that democratic?”