Developing a toolkit for Multi-agent modeling of the spread of fake information on social networks

Source abstract

This article discusses the development of a toolkit for multi-agent modeling of the spread of fake information on social networks. The work is based on the concept of "mental viruses" (memes) proposed by R. Dawkins. The social network is modeled as a graph, the topology of which is generated using the Barabási-Albert, Erdős-Rényi, and Watts-Strogatz models. The basic element of the system is a software agent simulating a user and having three states: neutral (Unaware), spreader (Spreader), and fact checker (FactChecker). The agent's behavior is determined by stochastic influence rules and a threshold function for state transitions based on the accumulated belief index.