When Yabola, a young mother, received a routine reminder that her child was due for immunisation, she did not expect to spend the night wrestling with doubt. The doubt did not come from a doctor or a scientist; it came in a WhatsApp message from her husband’s elder sister. The message warned that the vaccine was dangerous and alleged that Bill Gates wanted to reduce Africa’s population because the United States had a low population. Yabola’s scheduled clinic visit was only hours away, but the words from a trusted family member had planted fear in her heart. This hypothetical scenario,…

Few stories grip the public imagination quite like the idea of foreign spies tipping a national vote. When Andy Burnham spoke about Russian interference in the Brexit referendum, and when Ken McCallum, the head of MI5, immediately warned against exaggerating its impact, they set the terms of a familiar and dramatic debate. We are invited to picture Kremlin agents in dark rooms, manipulating social media, pushing memes and messages into the feeds of ordinary voters. That picture is alarming, and it deserves our attention. But in all the heat and smoke, something more obvious and equally troubling has been left…