Instinctively, Fake?

Instinctively, Fake?

If it’s too good to be true, or your gut instinct says “hang on, that doesn’t seem right”, chances are you have spotted a piece of fake news. But sometimes, the fake news is so convincing that even rudimentary fact checking doesn’t ‘out’ it instantly.

 

We’ve ‘borrowed’ the following from Marketing-Interactive (something for their upcoming conference), as it’s a great resource to highlight some of the basics of identifying fake news. Thanks guys for the cool resource, and for the conference too.

 

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Fake news has been with us for as long as news has been in existence, yet the vitriol for it spiked in recent years.  In a day and age where everyone can easily report and livestream something newsworthy with their phone cameras; citizen journalism, unfortunately, also helps those with malicious intent to promulgate mis/disinformation.

 

We work in the media industry so we like to study why they remain so pervasive and also to give pointers to detecting fake news to better protect yourself.

 

Here’s a rough but handy checklist:

 

Satire or Parody Sites

 

These are often for humor/entertainment and are usually over the top but you’d be surprised how many take them at face value as ‘truth’, keep a running bookmark list of sites such as The Onion, The Daily Mash, Babylon Bee, or New Nation SG or research the background of the site before re-posting or sharing.

 

[Orchan 2cents: Great when you ‘get’ the humour – but surprising the number of people who don’t realize the joke’s on them and share as if they are genuine news!].

 

Clickbait & Misleading Headlines

 

If the headline seems sensationalist, unless every major news network is also reporting something similar, it very well could be a story that leads to a page filled with ads or content tenuously related to the headline.  You help them earn revenue simply.

 

Sloppy Journalism

 

Be mindful of and always note the source of the information, even video can easily be edited, truncated or pieced together in a way that could present a different narrative or have someone make speeches that are completely fake (deep fake).

 

[Orchan 2cents: Journo’s can make mistakes too … we are all only human, after all].

 

Propaganda / Biased News

 

Take note if a media source consistently suppresses one side of information or chooses not to disclose opposing evidence in support of a certain cause or agenda, read multiple sources of the same story where possible.

 

[Orchan 2cents: This is the most dangerous form of ‘fake’ news in our opinion. A balanced story, especially of community / national interest, is needed to to not only inform, but to stimulate discussion and debate. Plus, bias is easy to see through, but not always understood].

 

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Now, as a plug, since we abridged their email content (post ideas can come from the most random of places), do check out their upcoming PR-Asia conference (1-2 December 2021). Some great speakers and content (way deeper and broader than this post) on issues relating to the PR and communications industry: https://conferences.marketing-interactive.com/pr-asia/