AI, Algorithms, and Misinformation: Law, Politics, and Our Digital Futures

This book examines how - in the 21st century world of big data and social media - artificial intelligence and algorithms are being used to predict our economic, political, and cultural activity.

Drawing inspiration from the concept of a "minority report," as introduced in Philip K. Dick’s 1956 short story, the book explores how the byproduct of digital content on social media often generates a collective perception of reality. This book breaks down how this collective perception is ultimately manufactured by cultural, political, and economic interests, and how additional issues - such as data errors, misinformation, and bias - can often render it false. Applying critical political economic analysis and cultural legal studies to these problems, Blevins emphasizes how we can do more to challenge the perceptions that pervade popular online discourse. Throughout the book, he demystifies the systems and processes that generate these information flows, enabling readers to better fight for remedies to the problem - legal and otherwise - and create a more just digital future.

This book will be of interest to students and scholars of media and communication studies, political science, sociology, and beyond who have an interest in understanding and addressing the impact AI, algorithms, and misinformation have on social media and society.

Jeffrey Layne Blevins is a Professor in the School of Public and International Affairs, and Faculty Fellow of the Center for Cyber Strategy and Policy at the University of Cincinnati. He is co-author of Social Media, Social Justice, and the Political Economy of Online Networks (2022), which won the 2023 Next Generation Indie Book Award for Best Non-Fiction eBook, and Social Media and Digital Politics: Networked Reason in an Age of Digital Emotions (2025), which won the 2026 AEJMC Tankard Book Award. Both of his co-authored books are with James Jaehoon Lee. Blevins is a frequently consulted expert for national news media on social media, politics and misinformation.