As you’re scrolling through your social media feed, you’re stopped in your tracks by some alarming news. So what do you do? You quickly read it, maybe post a comment, and share it with your contacts. But later in the day, you have a troubling thought: Was the story true? What if you just shared fake news? You know you didn’t check the source, and now you’re worried that you added to the rumor mill and, in a way, became part of the problem.
Not that long ago, we used to rely on a handful of TV channels, radio stations, and local newspapers to keep up with what’s going on in the world. But now we can get news from many more sources, and it’s available 24/7. The problem is that we don’t know if it’s true or not.
The internet and social media platforms have made it easy for us to share news with each other, but the information landscape has become increasingly murky. It’s easy to confuse real news with clickbait fabrications.
It’s become so widespread that Google and Facebook are still trying to figure out solutions from their side. But it’s a tricky position to be in. On the one hand, they don’t want people using their platforms to spread fake news since this damages their reputation. On the other hand, they need to respect people’s right to freedom of speech.
This is why we should all do our part in stopping the proliferation of fake news, which means we all need to have at least a basic level of media literacy. We can see the detrimental effect fake news has had on our society. While some people have begun to mistrust all sources of information and disengage, others feel they no longer need facts and evidence to support their claims.
In this article, we will show you how to separate truth from fake news so you can stay informed.
What Is Fake News and Where Does It Come From?
Fake news can be divided into two categories. In the first category, we have stories that are entirely fabricated with the purpose of making you believe something that isn’t true, buy something or visit a website.
The second category is made up of stories that have some truth to them but aren’t 100% accurate. To add to the confusion, we also have people putting the label of “fake news” on anything they disagree with.
Fake news isn’t new, but it can spread more easily in our digital world. Even university and college professors have noticed that their students sometimes reference questionable sources in their academic papers and started teaching them how to isolate a claim, seek the primary source and analyze the data that backs it up. If you’re a student and this has already happened to you, you can find more tools for writing academic papers using online sources here.
Journalism professors stress the importance of ethics and expect their students to be cautious and only report facts from credible sources. When journalists hear about an event “over the wire,” they may rework news stories from other publications, but they conduct their own investigations and add their own reporting. This means more than checking the information online. They track down the information by sending emails, making phone calls, and traveling to the scene of the event.
One thing you should know is that there are far more PR professionals than journalists, and branded content has gained a lot of traction in recent years. Journalists are bombarded with requests to publish articles related to various companies, and the companies themselves publish a lot of information related to their market sector.
For instance, you might be searching online for articles regarding traffic accidents. Many of the results you get will be branded content from personal injury law firms. Unfortunately, the people who write these articles often get their data from other online sources, so they may contain errors.
At the same time, the internet is filled with articles that only serve to attract users with sensational headlines in order to increase ad revenue.
Always Check the Source
A lot of the news we see on social media platforms is a mix of truth and fiction, so it’s important that you do some digging before you share. Even if you got the story from a close friend, it doesn’t mean it’s true. It might mean that they also didn’t double-check before sending it to you.
The first step is to track down the source. News organizations like CNN and NBC get a lot of criticism, but at least you can rest assured that their stories come from professional journalists who know how to fact-check before publishing. You’ll come across a lot of fake news sites that look official but aren’t.
A detail that should tip you off could be right in the URL. Spelling mistakes in the URL or endings like .com.co are red flags. The site might have familiar logos and a professional look, but they’re actually trying to trick you by imitating legitimate news sources, for example, creating a website similar to abcnews.com using the URL abcsnews.com or abcnews.com.co.
If you’re not familiar with the website, go to the “About Us” section. This is where you should find information about the company that runs the website, their team, mission, and statement. It should be fairly straightforward, and you should be able to find the members of the leadership team somewhere besides the site you’re on. If, on the other hand, the description is vague but melodramatic, you should be skeptical.
Sometimes these types of websites provide evidence for their statements by citing official sources like the World Health Organization. In that case, you can simply visit the source’s website to see if the information really matches.
You should also verify the author of the article, especially if it’s published on a website you’re not familiar with. You should be able to find them on other platforms where you can see what their credentials are. You can also check what other articles they’ve written to see if they’re reporting facts objectively or they have a tendency to speculate or exaggerate.
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