In April, the company yanked 1,887 misleading accounts, pages and groups tied to eight influencer networks building fake engagement.

Fake news -- United States -- Juvenile literature.

The game's developer Ndemic Creations is adding the new 'Fake News' game scenario to raise awareness about the dangers of falsehoods and internet conspiracy theories ahead of the UK election. The new mode is now available in the iOS version.

A team of social media analysts at an SA business school is tracking misinformation, disinformation, distortion and lies online.

Not sure which sources to trust when you're online? These browser plug-ins and online tools can help you figure out how to detect fake news sites.

After even mainstream outlets objected to a deceptively edited video of VP Mike Pence, comedian Jimmy Kimmel issued a sarcastic apology suggesting that lying about the Trump administration is fine because they don’t “value truth.”
Read Full Article at RT.com

The West’s adversarial journalism tradition designed to be watchdog of the government’s abuse of power would need some reformation in the midst of new media tools.

This year’s World Press Freedom Day on 3 May falls during COVID-19 lockdowns in many of our countries. Restriction on movement means journalists all over the world are facing obstacles in getting interviews and data, and verifying stories before publishing. In addition, the global pandemic has been used by many governments to control not just […]

The post Journalism is Not a Crime…and Fake News on Social Media is Not Journalism appeared first on Inter Press Service.

An analysis of the media consumption habits of people in the US shows that fake news makes up a tiny fraction of what they watch or read every day

Campaigns and consultants have spent the last four years worrying about the Trump campaign’s digital operation. Even before COVID-19 upended the election and forced candidates online, the Trump campaign was geofencing campaign rallies, micro-targeting digital ads, and amplifying deepfake videos.

And now, as both the crisis and the general election enter their third month, panic is beginning to set in about the startling digital gap between the two parties, amplified by the recent Trump campaign announcement of both a new app experience and the start of a $10 million digital push against Joe Biden. 

President Trump’s campaign manager has called what he’s built a “juggernaut” and is likening his digital infrastructure to a Death Star. In reality, what he's built is a trap.  

Read more at The Daily Beast.

Bollywood actors Ayushmann Khurrana, Kriti Sanon and Sara Ali Khan...

The post Virat Kohli, Ayushmann Khurrana, Sara Ali Khan And Kriti Sanon Come Together For A PSA On Fake News appeared first on Man's World India.

During this pandemic, fake news has spread as fast as the virus itself. Amelia Heathman investigates why

Journalists’ union argued page was ‘clear interference in press freedom’

The French government has taken down a Covid-19 “fake news” page after accusations that it had overstepped its constitutional role and infringed press freedoms.

A page called Desinfox – a play on the word desintox (detox) – appeared on the government’s website last week. It claimed to be busting disinformation about coronavirus in the French media.

Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, about 30 different quotes attributed to public figures including French infectious disease expert Didier Raoult, French president Emmanuel Macron and Madagascar president Andry Rajoelina have been making the rounds on Congolese Facebook pages. But it turns out all of them were made up. The FRANCE 24 Observers team tracked down the source of these widely circulated fake quotes and discovered a 20-year-old keen to generate “a buzz”.

While the COVID-19 cases continue to rise in Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC), the Navi Mumbai police department is having a tough time dealing with rumours. In last four days, rumours claiming Janta Curfew or a complete lockdown resulted in a panic-like situation in various parts of Navi Mumbai. However, alert cops managed to tackle the misinformation by alerting the citizens and booked two people.

Despite the systematic management and strategy, COVID-19 cases in NMMC and Panvel Municipal Corporation area are on the rise with more than 250 cases in Navi Mumbai Police Commissionerate area.

"On the night of April 27, a message was posted on a WhatsApp group that, as cases of Coronavirus had increased in Kamothe, to break the chain, a complete lockdown or Janta Curfew was announced from April 30 to May 3. The message further said that only medical shops and hospitals would function," an officer from Kamothe police station said.

"A police officer was part of the group who alerted us and we immediately started verifying the message which was fake. So we summoned the group admins Amol Shitole and Ganesh Shinde, who were questioned and booked," added the officer.

But as a result of the message, on April 28, several residents came out to buy groceries and other household items. To contain the situation, cops went to every shop and stores to assure people.

The same panic-like situation was observed at Kopar Khairane and Juinagar on Wednesday, after the same message with the name of 'Corona Nirmulan Samiti' went viral – with the only difference being the location. As soon as the message went viral, grocery stores ran dry within a few hours. "We don't know the origin of these messages. But some people deliberately spread such messages, which not only spreads panic but also hampers our tireless work of almost a month" a senior police officer said.

Speaking with mid-day, Sanjay Kumar, Navi Mumbai Police Commissioner said, "We have noticed the spread of messages in the social media groups of non-existent curfew and are dealing strongly with such rumour mongers. People should keep track of official accounts and words about such important decisions."

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Eminent industrialist Ratan Tata, on Sunday took to Instagram to call out a fake news article and a quote which was attributed to him. Taking to the gram, the 82-year-old business veteran shared a picture of a news clipping that read, "Ratan Tata's message: 2020 is the year of survival, don’t worry about profit and loss."

A screengrab of Ratan Tata's Instagram story

While sharing a story on Instagram, Ratan Tata wrote, "The following article has not been written or said by me. He also shared a picture of the article with 'Fake News' written on the newspaper cutting. Urging people to always verify news sources, Ratan Tata said, "I will endeavour to call out fake news whenever I can."

Talking about the fake article which has a quote attributed to him, Ratan Tata stated, "My picture alongside a quote does not guarantee me having said it, a problem that many people face." The business magnate also called out the fake news and shared it with his 8.5 million followers on Twitter.

I’m afraid this too, has not been said by me. I will endeavour to call out fake news whenever I can, but would encourage you to always verify news sources. My picture alongside a quote does not guarantee me having said it, a problem that many people face. pic.twitter.com/pk0S75FxPA

— Ratan N. Tata (@RNTata2000) May 3, 2020

Since being shared online, Ratan Tata's tweet has garnered over one lakh likes and about 25,000 re-tweets and counting. This isn't the first time that the senior statesman has taken on fake news circulating under his name. Earlier, Mr. Tata had shared another fake article attributed to him and which spoke about the impact of coronavirus on the economy.

In the spirit of solidarity pic.twitter.com/1Svx5JZ0Vb

— Ratan N. Tata (@RNTata2000) April 5, 2020

While sharing that the article was fake, the industrialist stated that if he has to say something, he would say it on his official social media channels. Debunking the false article, Mr. Tata urged people to stay safe and take care of themselves amid the coronavirus crisis.

Nearly a month ago, Ratan Tata shared a beautiful picture of India's COVID-19 warriors. While sharing the picture with his followers, Mr. Tata urged people across the country to unite in the battle against the global pandemic.

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As the deadly coronavirus infection spreads fast in India and elsewhere, even faster is the spread of fake news regarding the pandemic and experts warn this 'infodemic' can have huge economic costs for companies across the world in addition to health concerns for the public at large. While authorities have announced severe penal actions for those spreading fake news regarding this pandemic, which has already caused nearly 2 lakh deaths globally with more than 28 lakh infections since its outbreak in China last December, widespread misinformation surrounding the disease has seen people drinking disinfectants and industrial alcohol while trying various rumoured treatments.

False claims and fake news, mostly forwarded through social media platforms, have also led to several cases of religion-based attacks, hate speeches and other discriminatory activities, while cyber frauds are also on the rise with scamsters seeking to take advantage of the crisis situation. In addition to the damages caused to public health and societal behaviour, experts warn the undeterred wave of fake news poses a huge risk to corporates, for whom it becomes difficult at times to filter out the right information that is crucial for them to ensure success of their business continuity, especially when almost the entire world is locked down.

Farah Lalani, who is a community creator for media, entertainment and information industries at the Geneva-based World Economic Forum (WEF), said businesses need to be proactive about calling out misinformation that is spreading about their brand, directing customers to official channels and making sure there is always clear and up to date information on all their social accounts. "While bad actors, fraudsters, and uninformed users can spread fabricated or misleading information, if businesses collaborate closely with the entire media ecosystem and regulatory bodies, they can start to work together to solve this very challenging problem," she told PTI.

In India, some organisations including industry bodies and advocacy groups have begun compiling official and credible information about the COVID-19 fight and the ongoing lockdown to help companies in their preparedness for tackling the crisis. Leading advocacy group Chase India, which was among the first to start this practice right from the initial days of the COVID-19 crisis emerging as a major threat in the country, has been sending across multiple daily updates to its clients, including on the latest actions taken by the central and state governments and also on initiatives being taken by various corporates.

Experts said the correct information is necessary for companies to help them understand, analyse and then implement various new guidelines being issued by the central and state governments. "In today's circumstances, besides the current public health crisis of COVID-19 and socio-economic impact related to climate change, one of the biggest concerns is legitimate and timely sourcing of information," Chase India's co-founder and Executive Vice President Manash K Neog said.

"As a public policy consultancy, our key challenge during the pre-lockdown phase was to mitigate frenzy around rumours of lockdown for our clients as it was creating panic for the operational teams of clients. "Further to that, we have institutionalised mechanisms such as our hourly and daily COVID-19 advisory trackers for the central and state governments to support clients with timely and authentic information basis which they are able to better plan their business continuity strategies," he added.

According to experts, companies are working hard to ensure timely access to right information as costs could be too high for them if they fall for some misinformation and in such a situation the role of media is also very important. Releasing a new survey recently, which found that just about one-fourth of the consumers in India currently pay for news but nearly two-thirds are willing to pay, the WEF said the current coronavirus challenge further emphasises the indispensable role that the media plays in society today.

With social media becoming the main platform for spread of false claims, giants like Facebook and Twitter have also begun deleting such posts and taking other actions. Some of the posts deleted on such grounds include those of public figures as well, the most famous being posts shared by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro in which he had claimed anti-malaria prescription drug hydroxychloroquine was an effective treatment for COVID-19.

Twitter had also deleted a post by Venezuela's President Nicolas Maduro in which he had apparently endorsed a "brew" for eliminating infectious genes. Various social media platforms have also imposed several restrictions on advertisements claiming various cures for COVID-19, while hate content regarding the pandemic is also being dealt with sternly. However, all these steps have not been able to totally eradicate the fake news flow, which the World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described as 'infodemic' in the context of the novel coronavirus.

"We are not just fighting an epidemic, we are fighting an infodemic," he said, referring to fake news as something that "spreads faster and more easily than this virus". United Nations' chief Antonio Guterres too said last month that an "infodemic of misinformation" was also an enemy that we all need to fight while battling COVID-19.

"To overcome the coronavirus, we need to urgently promote 'facts and science' and 'hope and solidarity' over despair and division," he said.

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Representational Image

To stop false news from spreading on its platform, Facebook has said it put in place a three-pronged strategy that constitutes removing accounts and content that violate its policies, reducing the distribution of inauthentic content and informing people by giving them more context on the posts they see.

Another part of its strategy in some countries is partnering with third-party fact-checkers to review and rate the accuracy of articles and posts on Facebook, Tessa Lyons, a Facebook product manager on News Feed focused on false news, said in a statement on Thursday.

The social media giant is facing criticism for its role in enabling political manipulation in several countries around the world. It has also come under the scanner for allegedly fuelling ethnic conflicts owing to its failure to stop the deluge of hate-filled posts against the disenfranchised Rohingya Muslim minority in Myanmar.

"False news is bad for people and bad for Facebook. We're making significant investments to stop it from spreading and to promote high-quality journalism and news literacy," Lyons said.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Tuesday told the European Parliament leaders that the social networking giant is trying to plug loopholes across its services, including curbing fake news and political interference on its platform in the wake of upcoming elections globally, including in India.

Lyons said Facebook's three-pronged strategy roots out the bad actors that frequently spread fake stories.

"It dramatically decreases the reach of those stories. And it helps people stay informed without stifling public discourse," Lyons added.

Although false news does not violate Facebook's Community Standards, it often violates the social network's polices in other categories, such as spam, hate speech or fake accounts, which it removes remove.

"For example, if we find a Facebook Page pretending to be run by Americans that's actually operating out of Macedonia, that violates our requirement that people use their real identities and not impersonate others. So we'll take down that whole Page, immediately eliminating any posts they made that might have been false," Lyons explained.

Apart from this, Facebook is also using machine learning to help its teams detect fraud and enforce its policies against spam.

"We now block millions of fake accounts every day when they try to register," Lyons added.

A lot of the misinformation that spreads on Facebook is financially motivated, much like email spam in the 90s, the social network said.

If spammers can get enough people to click on fake stories and visit their sites, they will make money off the ads they show.

"We're figuring out spammers' common tactics and reducing the distribution of those kinds of stories in News Feed. We've started penalizing clickbait, links shared more frequently by spammers, and links to low-quality web pages, also known as 'ad farms'," Lyons said.

"We also take action against entire Pages and websites that repeatedly share false news, reducing their overall News Feed distribution," Lyons said.

Facebook said it does not want to make money off of misinformation or help those who create it profit, and so such publishers are not allowed to run ads or use its monetisation features like Instant Articles.

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As 690 new COVID-19 cases were reported on Wednesday, Singapore warned against spreading fake news and videos about migrant workers, saying this could disturb the law and order situation in dormitories where a large number of foreign workers have tested positive. A total of 15,641 people, including 12,183 migrant workers, have contracted the virus in the city-state so far.

Law and Home Affairs Minister K Shanmugam warned that such videos can lead to serious law and order incidents. He said the authorities are watching individuals who spread the videos "very carefully". Warning those spreading fake news maliciously, he said, they will be charged if a crime was committed. Hundreds of thousands of foreign workers have been barred from leaving their cramped dormitories to curb the spread of COVID-19, according to a Channel News Asia report on Wednesday.

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This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed, agencies. Mid-day accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability, trustworthiness, reliability and data of the text. Mid-day management/mid-day.com reserves the sole right to alter, delete or remove (without notice) the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever

This may come as a surprise to most serious policymakers, but here’s a fact: not all that is “news” is fact-checked information. Worse, non-facts are frequently introduced into stories and passed off as facts. Welcome to the new information world. It is unsettling, and hardly augurs well for robust policymaking. So what can be done about it?

French regulator says agency failed to verify false story that sent Vinci shares down 18%

The former Fox CEO commits millions to battle against disinformation

The 'news story' about the case of mistaken identity was reported during the show on Thursday morning, with the Australian presenters giggling about the bizarre tale.

President Donald Trump claimed that reports of North Korea's Kim Jong Un being gravely ill was 'fake news' from CNN during Thursday's daily COVID-19 briefing

The president began what could be the most significant day so far in Robert Mueller's Russia probe pre-emptively lashing out at the special counsel's office in a tweetstorm.

Creating fears about shortages of products in shops to 'spread uncertainty' and undermine the West would be straight out of the 'Russian toolbox', one British official said.

Hassan Norouzi, who is a spokesman for the Iranian parliament's judicial committee, said 'spreading lies' is punishable by one to three years in prison with flogging, in line with Shariah law.

Ivanka Trump is hitting back with her own jokes after social media exploded following the awkward hug she exchanged with Marco Rubio Tuesday morning on Capitol Hill.

DR ELLIE CANNON: Even in my position, it is hard not to be sucked in by the scare stories or to be frightened by the amateur statisticians tweeting online. Some of the claims I read make my blood boil.

EXCLUSIVE BY MIKE KEEGAN: Users were directed to bogus stories which reported persistent slurs against the Premier League champions.

A re-edited version of a GMB interview with Sir Keir Starmer yesterday ran online showing him unable to answer a question from Piers Morgan. The full exchange showed him answering immediately.

Despite serving a prison term in Pennsylvania, Bill Cosby, 82, or someone on his behalf, took to Twitter do decry the mainstream US press and urge his followers to support black media outlets.

It looks like the fun has continued for Peter Stefanovic, who shared a comical photo of himself to Instagram on Thursday.

President Donald Trump claimed that reports of North Korea's Kim Jong Un being gravely ill was 'fake news' from CNN during Thursday's daily COVID-19 briefing

Fact-checkers have identifies multiple false posts and the Silicon Valley tech firms are battling to stop such claims from spreading to avoid mass hysteria

They will join Health Secretary Matt Hancock and top health figures including Chief Medical Officer Professor Chris Whitty and Sir Simon Stevens, the head of NHS England.

EXCLUSIVE BY MIKE KEEGAN: Users were directed to bogus stories which reported persistent slurs against the Premier League champions.

Here's a selection of Business Standard Opinion pieces for the day

Apple CEO Tim Cook wants the tech industry to take action against "fake news" stories that are polluting the web.

Indian skipper Virat Kohli on Monday pledged support in the fight against fake forwards on social media, saying the nation needs to play together to win this battle.

That's the thing about fake news - it appears believable. But how can you verify it?

Cyber experts have recorded 30-35% rise in fake news on social media during the lockdown while the internet usage has gone up by 30%.

Bandra, Majestic and now Mangaluru railway station. Misled by fake forwards on social media that trains were being run to take them home, more than 800 migrant workers from Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Assam and Bihar gathered at the station on Thursday and held protests after their hopes were dashed.

Vijay Deverakonda's video against fake news has been supported by many South actors, including Telugu superstar Mahesh Babu.

WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned instant messaging platform is one of those services which is consistently receiving updates amidst the epidemic situation due to coronavirus outbreak. It is one of the most widely used services on mobile platforms and is used by the

Twitter has taken over London startup Fabula AI which is exploring ways to detect fake news. The startup claims to have patented a technology dubbed Geometric Deep Learning that shows high success rates in identifying disinformation of social media platforms. 

Facebook has filed a case against a Thailand-based Indiantechie for running a software application company that passesaround their advertising analysis process and pushed fake adsas well as false information about coronavirus on its socialmedia platform. Facebook filed the case

Anasuya Bharadwaj is unquestionably one of the actresses of Tollywood, who never shy away from taking a stand on various issues. Her tongue in cheek responses to tweets have also been turned into controversies. We recently reported on Vijay Deverakonda's fight