How can I tell whether I am reading fake news or facts?

In recent years, the circulation of fake news, misinformation and disinformation has increased significantly, with a notable rise during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Adobe Stock

What could have been the reason for this sharp rise in fake news during the pandemic?

Pandemics, or any kind of crisis for that matter, always bring uncertainty with them. There are so many unknowns; as a result, a lot of false information, including conspiracy theories, thrives. These theories offer easy, simple explanations and satisfy people's need for closure: they decrease uncertainty. Another reason is that officials and experts themselves are often not sure about what information is true and what is not. The virus is new. We need time to research it and find out how lethal it is, and what measures are working and what are not. As a result, something that was thought to be true at the beginning of the crisis can be found to be false at a later stage. This also creates a dilemma for journalists and the media.

How can you distinguish fake news from facts?

Fergus McIntosh, the head research editor at The New Yorker, famous for its relentless and rigorous fact-checking practices, talks about the challenges of fact-checking in the post-truth era. It’s an amazing talk and very informative, both for readers and journalists. Basically, he suggests thinking of fact-checking more as an iterative process and not a one-time solution. Some examples of the techniques McIntosh recommends include isolating the main claims and asking yourself what the claim is made here, what the evidence is, how credible it is, and what the source is. Acting like a hostile reader, meaning trying to look at the claim from the opposite point of view, is also helpful. In other words, you need to be critical and be so constantly. Finally, checking multiple sources to see how the same story is covered and framed could also help flesh out the facts. There are also websites that are specifically concerned with fact-checking, such as PolitiFact or Correctiv. In general, media literacy should be mandatory in schools and universities, because broader structural changes are necessary to help citizens make informed choices about information when it comes to their media consumption and media diet, especially in the era of deep fakes and artificial intelligence.

What is the best way to respond when confronted with fake news in a discussion?

It depends on the social context and your relationship with people who introduce the piece of fake news, so there is no single universal solution. There is a big difference when you see a video with fake information in the profile or the news feed of your peer, and when your parents or your supervisor start telling you that you should not vaccinate because Bill Gates inserted chips in the vaccines. Sometimes, you can directly confront the person who makes a false claim, but it is not possible in all cases, and often, it can do more harm than good both to your relationship with the person and the person’s beliefs in fake information. There is a good piece in Time by Angela Haupt that discusses some strategies that you can use to avoid a confrontation: for instance, you can ask where people found fake news and why they think these sources are worth trusting (and other sources are not). You can also remind people that conspiracy theories that demonise specific groups are not about some fictional monsters, but about real people with real lives. For instance, it is easy to claim that Big Pharma or migrants are all universally evil and inhuman creatures and just want to destroy good people’s lives, but it becomes a bit more challenging if you can remind that people who migrate or work in the health industry are the same people as the ones discussing such claims