Hong Kong (AFP)

Videos tampered with to deceive the public, imaginary murders, skewed information: the Hong Kong people are beset by a deluge of false news on the internet, spread by the pro-democracy camp as by the pro-Beijing, and which exacerbate the hatred.

"I assume that everything is wrong, unless I have sources from both sides and if more than two trusted media say the same thing," says 27-year-old Hong Kong's Michael Wu.

Members of each camp tend to indulge in their own online chat rooms, in a vacuum, where they exchange the same kind of information over and over again.

"Even when the truth breaks out, people are still ready to believe anything, as long as it makes their cause progress," said Wu.

The protest movement began in June with the rejection of a draft law to allow extradition to mainland China. It has since been suspended, but protesters have expanded their demands, including universal suffrage.

An official of Kauyim Media, a Facebook page that checks information on the Hong Kong news and has 140,000 subscribers, believes that "disinformation amplifies fears, hatred and confusion among Hong Kong people."

- Suicide -

"When the damage is done, it takes time to catch up," he told AFP.

The spread of rumors is fueled by the deep distrust of the protesters towards the police, accused of disproportionate violence.

When the body of a 15-year-old girl was drafted in Hong Kong harbor, netizens linked the incident to protests. Despite the video surveillance footage and the denial of his mother making sure it is a suicide.

In early November, the death of a 22-year-old student, who fell from a multi-storey car park, caused an uproar among the protesters. Rumors, also spread by elected officials on Twitter, claimed without evidence that the man had been pushed by police.

The new Hong Kong police chief, Chris Tang Ping-keung, said this week that the false news could "undermine the credibility of the police".

The camp opposite is not left out, especially the Chinese state media, hostile to protesters they invariably claim the term "rioters" - whether violent or peaceful.

Example with a video published on the social network Weibo by the League of Communist Youth: it shows protesters seemingly threatening an old lady.

- 'Content handled' -

After verification, AFP discovered that the clip was mounted. The older person was actually scolding the police for protecting the protesters.

"The editing was very well done and that's why the false news is so harmful," said Chinese cartoonist Badiucao, based in Australia and become Beijing's pet peeve.

According to him, the media and social networks of mainland China broadcast a "manipulated content" in order to "paint a deceptive picture of the demonstrators in Hong Kong".

When rioters holed up at a Hong Kong university last weekend torched a police vehicle, photos claiming to show the horribly burned driver found themselves on the internet in a matter of hours.

Manipulation, discovered AFP: this shot is actually from 2018 and comes from Malaysia.

"A lot of things we receive, we have no way to verify their authenticity," said AFP a 60-year-old retiree, who said he was bombarded with information on social networks about demonstrations. "You can not trust any source, there's too much information, it's accumulating in your head, and it's not good for your health."

ec-ry-rb-ceb / ehl / glr

© 2019 AFP