The reliability of social media in emergency situations is called into question after Twitter cap blocks DriveBC posts
When Brandon Broderick was ordered to evacuate from his home in Tumbler Ridge, BC last month, social media became a major way to get updates.
He was allowed to return home on June 15, but said he often turned to Facebook for reassurance during the week he was away.
“We followed social media because that was our understanding of the real environment,” the photographer told CBC News on Tuesday. “And we found that a lot of places were using Facebook, like the BC Wildfire Service and the district.”
However, social media concerns have been raised during emergencies after BC’s Department of Transportation was blocked last week from posting essential route and travel information to Twitter during the province’s wildfire season.
As more British Columbians like Broderick prepare for evacuation orders and warnings over hundreds of fires in the interior of the province, many are still turning to social media for the latest vital information, despite government encouragement to use official websites.
The issue came to the fore on July 2, when a popular route advice Twitter feed from BC’s Department of Transportation and Infrastructure unexpectedly was blocked from posting route updates to Twitter.
“DriveBC on Twitter and its sub-accounts have exceeded the temporarily imposed postal rate limit,” said the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure tweeted on July 2.
While DriveBC was back to tweeting within an hour, several emergency experts have expressed concerns about authorities’ ability to communicate in the event of a disaster.
“It’s mind-boggling to have such a dramatic, immediate effect,” said Peter Chow-White, director of the GENA Lab and professor of communications at Simon Fraser University. “There’s a continuum of risk, from anxiety to confusion to not being connected to people in your life.
“But it’s clear that in times of crisis, where it’s something like a fire and earthquake, it could be human life… It hasn’t reached the stage where it’s deadly, but it could be.”
DriveBC apologized on Twitter for the inconvenience to motorists. It had exceeded the number of tweets it was allowed to read or use under a new, but reportedly temporary, Twitter policy that limits accounts to a certain number of reads to prevent data scraping, according to its owner, Elon Musk.
Other BC government accounts that offer critical updates — such as the BC Wildfire Service, BC Hydro, and the Emergency Preparedness Ministry — said they didn’t run into the same problem.
Authorities elsewhere have similar concerns.
The United States The National Weather Service storm update account also faced Twitter’s new restrictions and was blocked from posting on July 4. The New York City Transit Authority announced it would no longer use Twitter for service updates and said the “reliability of the platform can no longer be guaranteed”.
‘It’s harder to trust’
Asked via email for comment about concerns about using Twitter for essential and emergency communications, the company sent an automatic response — a poop emoji — something CEO Elon Musk announced in March for emails sent to Twitter’s media relations email account.
Broderick said the sudden changes are concerning.
“There are many routes [in B.C.] that will be affected by fire,” he said [DriveBC] not being able to keep people informed, that’s not good.”
LOOK | Communications expert speaks about reliability of social media in a disaster:
After DriveBC was briefly blocked from tweeting route updates following a change to Twitter policy on July 2, SFU social media expert Ahmed Al-Rawi says it raises serious concerns about how vital information gets to the public must be communicated during a disaster.
But since many people assume government social media accounts are reliably up-to-date, Simon Fraser University communications expert Ahmed Al-Rawi said officials should be wary of relying too much on private social media accounts. media companies to convey critical information.
That said, governments can’t avoid using social media when the public is there looking for answers and updates.
“It’s becoming more of a necessary evil these days,” Al-Rawi said. “So on the one hand we need social media, but on the other hand it’s getting harder and harder to rely on.”
He said as more platforms emerge for those unhappy with existing social media services, governments will have to consider where they post. Al-Rawi recommends putting information in as many places as possible to ensure it reaches every possible demographic.
Just weeks before Twitter’s changes, several social media giants and Google threatened to prevent Canadian news articles from being shared on their platforms in response to a controversial federal law ostensibly designed to protect Canadian journalism.
BC says official apps and websites are the best way to get accurate and timely alerts in a crisis situation.
For Tumbler Ridge’s Broderick, the misinformation and confusion he says he sometimes sees on social media sites during this wildfire season is a good reminder to be wary of anything that doesn’t come from an official source or a credible media outlet.
“Don’t put all your eggs in the social media basket.”
