Legally Protected Areas in the Human Rights Act
Under the Canadian Human Rights Act (opens in new tab), the following are legally protected areas from discrimination:
- Race
- National or ethnic origin
- Colour
- Religion
- Age
- Sex
- Sexual orientation
- Gender identity or expression
- Marital status
- Family status
- Genetic characteristics
- Disability
- Conviction for an offence for which a pardon has been granted or in respect of which a record suspension has been ordered
Remember: EA data can not be used for determining terms or eligibility of an individual for employment, credit, healthcare, housing or insurance.
Tactics of Disinformation
Tactics of disinformation involve tactics and techniques used to purposefully spread disinformation. This can be done by creating fake social media accounts, using AI to alter images and other ways to mislead individuals. Examples of tactics include:
- Cultivate Fake or Misleading Personas and Websites: using fake personas and websites to increase the believability of their messages.
- Create Deepfakes and Synthetic Media: digitally manipulating or fabricating media with the intent on misleading the viewer.
- Devise or Amplify Conspiracy Theories: capitalizing on conspiracy theories by generating disinformation narratives that align with the conspiracy worldview.
- Astroturfing and Flooding the Information Environment: posting overwhelming amounts of content with the same or similar messaging from several inauthentic accounts.
- Abuse Alternative Platforms: taking advantage of platforms with fewer user protections, less stringent content moderation policies, and fewer controls to detect and remove inauthentic content and accounts than other social media platforms.
- Exploit Information Gaps: exploiting when there is insufficient credible information to satisfy a search inquiry by generating their own influence content and seeding the search term on social media to encourage people to look it up.
- Manipulate Unsuspecting Actors: targeting prominent individuals and organizations to help amplify their narratives.
- Spread Targeted Content: producing tailored influential content likely to resonate with a specific audience based on their worldview and interests in order to become an influencer.
You can read more about tactics of disinformation in this document (opens in new tab) produced by Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).
Although disinformation tactics are designed to deceive and manipulate, critically evaluating content and verifying information with credible sources before deciding to share it can increase resilience against disinformation and slow its spread.
Share these tips:
- Recognize the risk
- Question the source
- Investigate the issue
- Think before you link
- Talk with your social circle
Tactics of disinformation are not just about stigmatized groups. Often, psychographic profiles and behavioural data are exploited for this purpose. EA has introduced terms and conditions in our license agreements prohibiting inappropriate uses of our data, as well as enforcement mechanisms if clients are found to be using EA data products inappropriately.
Ready to continue? Let's move on to Understanding Attribute Disclosure.