TL;DR Version: Many of us think a lot of disinformation & misinformation were presented by both media & government. We are not exactly sure of motives yet have quite a few strong suspicions, the main one boiling down to "follow the money". Profit over life is an old story.
disinformation
:false information deliberately and often covertly spread (as by the planting of rumors) in order to influence public opinion or obscure the truth
The first definition is different from the second. In the second, information simply could be erroneous out of someone's ignorance or lack of knowing. That ignorance can be excused. Deliberate passing of known false information is the same as lying, not excusable.