

6.1 Fact-checking websites and journalists.5.21.5 Conspiracy theories and 2016 pizzeria attack.5.21.4 Legislative and executive responses.4.4.1 Internet trolls shift focus to Trump.Google and Facebook each said on Monday that they will ban fake news sites from using their respective ad-selling software. Still, it’s pretty strange to think that Macedonian website owners were gaming Google’s or Facebook’s ad programs to make money off fake-but-viral news stories. Maybe we should be glad they’re not turning to cybercrime to capitalize on our collective naiveté, like young people in other parts of Eastern Europe have done. The motive wasn’t political it was to make money off your clicks. Who’s writing this fake news?Īccording to a Buzzfeed story, young people in Macedonia created more than 100 pro-Trump websites to spread false news. New York Magazine writer Brian Feldman programmed a plugin too - it’s not automated, but it checks articles against a list of known fake news sites put together by Merrimack College media professor Melissa Zimdars. The plugin isn’t available for download yet, but the students are enlisting help in finishing it, through an open-source project. Programmers have put their heads down to come up with tools that can flag unverified reports in your social-media feeds.įor example, four students programmed a browser plugin that automatically evaluates stories linked in social media and highlights those that have been debunked elsewhere. Pro tip: You can do this with photos from dating and real estate websites too, and you might catch a scammer while you’re at it! It turned out the suffragist in the photo was Britain’s Ada Wright, not Anthony.

The photo showed a woman in a Victorian gown lying in the street as police and bystanders stood over her. I tried this on a black-and-white photo that ran with a meme about Susan B. Google will tell you its best guess as to who or what is pictured and where the image originated. Drag the screenshot into the Google Images search field.Take a screenshot of the photo, cropping out everything but the image itself.If you see a compelling photo and are just itching to share the story behind it, try this first: An article claiming President Barack Obama banned the national anthem at US sporting events - false, if you were wondering - came from a website with the suffix “.com.de,” which makes no sense.įinally, don’t trust a photograph. If it has a strange ending, think twice about the story. If it sounds like it could be a headline on the Onion, it’s best to double-check the story.Īlso check the URL. Some stories, intentionally or not, read like satire. Use a search engine to look for the keywords in the story to see if that “news” is being reported by any other outlets. If the potentially false story you’re reading doesn’t link to an original source, well, that’s a bad sign.
