Calgary Public Library is trying to help voters navigate a confusing information environment as Albertans prepare to vote on ten referendum questions this month.
The library is creating online resources and hosting public events aimed at helping people understand the ballot questions, while also providing tools to identify misinformation and disinformation.
Sofia Batinic, the library’s lead of events and partnerships, said the programming grew out of conversations they were already having with people in the community, including newcomers looking for information about the referendum.
“I think an institution like the library is a foundational institution. We’re a place where people go for learning and they look to us as a trusted source of information,” said Batinic in an interview with the Calgary Journal.
With voters encountering large amounts of political misinformation and disinformation online, that role is becoming increasingly important.
Misleading online environments
Lori Williams, an associate professor and researcher at MRU, said the amount of misleading information circulating around the referendum is unlike anything voters have faced in past campaigns.
“I’m speaking to many people who are confused and overwhelmed just by the process and the questions on the referendum. They’re trying to find accurate, helpful, balanced information, and it’s proving to be very difficult for them to do so,” said Williams.
She was speaking at the library’s event Truth in Public Political Discourse: Recognizing Mis/Disinformation, which took place on Oct. 2.
Williams said the problem goes beyond factual mistakes. Some misleading content is designed to simply attract clicks. Other content, with connections to Russia for example, is used strategically to influence political debate.
“Many of the actors that are engaged in this are trying to promote and capitalize on rage,” said Williams. “And, of course, there are those malign actors who actually have an interest in sowing division and weakening other political entities.”
That becomes especially concerning when voters are being asked to make decisions directly on public policy.
“Democracy hinges on being able to cast an informed ballot. We’re about to cast a ballot on a set of referendum questions, and it’s difficult to get good, reliable information,” said Williams.
Anonymous influence
Recent research shows how widely misleading political content can spread online.
A report from the Canadian Digital Media Research Network identified 20 inauthentic YouTube channels targeting Albertans that had collectively received nearly 40 million views.
The channels used AI-generated avatars and paid American actors while presenting themselves as Albertan voices and promoting narratives around Alberta secession and U.S. annexation.
CBC News also reported that Rise of Alberta, an anonymous pro-separatist social media account with almost 100,000 followers on X, had connections to Alberta separatist lawyer Keith Wilson.
According to the investigation, the same email address had been used to register the Rise of Alberta website and websites connected to Wilson. CBC researchers also found Rise of Alberta merchandise returns were directed to the mailing address of Wilson’s law firm.
Wilson told CBC he knows the person running the account but has no control over its content.
Rise of Alberta posts have mixed separatist messaging with conspiratorial and derogatory content, including referring to climate change as “fake and gay.”
The identity of the person operating it remains unknown.
Williams said Wilson’s connection to Rise of Alberta raises questions about accountability for influential political messaging.
“He’s one of the more balanced, respectable separatists and he says he doesn’t police the information that goes through this, but he’s not taking responsibility for something that could be quite damaging,” said Williams.
“So, if you want separation badly enough and you don’t care what it takes, what you have to say in order to get support for separation, that certainly is a danger.”
Growing use of artificial intelligence
Research into political deepfakes has found that people can struggle to identify manipulated videos and that realistic fabricated content can influence how viewers understand what they are seeing.
Alberta has also introduced new rules around political deepfakes. The Justice Statutes Amendment Act, 2026 prohibits creating or distributing certain deepfakes that are likely to mislead voters about the actions or statements of political candidates, elected officials and Elections Alberta staff.
It’s unclear how effective these rules have been, as Alberta is now being looked at by experts as a case study on the impacts of AI within political discourse.
“A number of organizations are trying to monitor this, but with AI, it proliferates much faster than we can track effectively, and it becomes extremely difficult to counter. So, the question is, ‘How do we do that?’”
Spaces for reliable information
Williams said part of the answer may be creating spaces where people can find reliable information and discuss what they are seeing outside their own online feeds.
“If we promote more positive, correct information, and we actually meet in, whether it’s a virtual public square or an actual public square, we can provide more positive alternatives,” said Williams. “That’s likely going to be an important way of trying to counter this.”
The library’s referendum programming, Batinic said, was partly a response to what library staff were already hearing from patrons.
She said uncertainty about whether information online can be trusted has itself become part of the problem.
“Broadly, I think just people are struggling and unsure,” said Batinic. “They hear of cases where their friends or colleagues have been kind of roped into some misinformation or disinformation, and they wonder, ‘Oh, have I done that, too? And how can I be sure?’”
Supporting media literacy
Both the library and Elections Alberta recommend slowing down before sharing political information and checking where it came from.
Elections Alberta identifies several warning signs, including doctored images and videos, using old photos or articles without their original context, presenting data without naming a source and anonymous posts designed to provoke fear or anger.
Williams said even those steps cannot make every misleading piece of content easy to spot.
“Some of this is pretty convincing and difficult to detect, so it’s a real challenge.”
Still, voters don’t have to figure it out alone.
“For the purposes of this referendum, there are a lot of people that are working to try to get correct information out and to challenge mis- and disinformation,” said Williams.
For voters who are unsure about something they see online, Batinic said one of the simplest places to start is with the source itself. Find out where the information came from and compare it with other reliable sources.
