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DeepTrust: A Deep Learning Approach for Measuring Social Media Users Trustworthiness

Veracity of data posted on the microblog platforms has in recent years been a subject of intensive study by professionals specializing in various fields of informatics as well as sociology, particularly in the light of increasing importance of online tools for news spreading. On Twitter and similar sites, it is possible to report on ongoing situations globally with minimal delay, while the cost of such reporting remains negligible. One of the most important features of this social network is that content delivery can be customized to allow users to focus only on news items covering subject matters they find interesting. With this in mind, it becomes necessary to create verification mechanisms that can ascertain whether the claims made on Twitter can be taken seriously and prevent false content from spreading too far. This study demonstrates an innovative System for verification of information that can fulfill the role described above. The System is comprised of four mutually connected modules: a legacy module, a trustworthiness classifier; a module managing user authority, and a ranking procedure. All of the modules function within an integrated framework and jointly contribute to an accurate classification of messages and authors. Effectiveness of the solution was evaluated empirically on a sample of Twitter users, with a strict 10-fold evaluation procedure applied for each module. The findings indicate that the solution successfully meets the primary objectives of the study and performs its function as expected.