(QESP Editor’s Note: The following is a reprint of a Dec 3, 2019 article in The Verge by Adi Robertson. The original is available at https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/3/20980741/fake-news-facebook-twitter-misinformation-lies-fact-check-how-to-internet-guide The original has a Further Reading Guide with links to other research organisations and institutes. You can also listen to the discussion on The Vergecast)

A few months ago, I got angry about something on Twitter. Somebody had tweeted a photo of a paper sign in an apartment building, informing tenants that using the elevator would soon cost $35 a month. It was surprising, but on a gut level, exactly the kind of behavior I’d expect from a greedy landlord — the kind of thing that’s easy to furiously retweet without thinking.

But a little digging showed that the photo was uploaded to Reddit back in 2013, and the post’s author said the signs were quickly taken down. The building manager denied writing them to both the author and a reporter, suggesting that this was either a prank or an immediately abandoned plan. Retweeting the photo would have just outraged people about something that had seemingly never happened.

This kind of viral half-truth is part of the fabric of today’s internet, and the kind of anger it inspired has been turned into a dangerous commodity. It’s cynically exploited by businesses for ad-supported “fake news,” by scammers raising money online, and by authoritarian governments to spread hate and fear.

I don’t want to blame people who fall for these tricks. A lot of the problems are exacerbated by companies, governments, and other factors that individuals can’t control. But the internet is full of grifters, tricksters, and outright liars who rely on people’s basic trust to amplify their message. It’s worth slowing down and carefully navigating their traps — to avoid spreading an alarming false rumor, getting angry at a group of people for something they didn’t do, or perpetuating an honest misunderstanding.

And as a person who does care deeply about putting true things online, I know I’ve personally misunderstood stories because I didn’t think to look more closely, and not always because somebody was deliberately fooling me. It took me years to really understand where all the information I saw online was coming from. So this isn’t just a guide to spotting when something is fake. It’s a system for slowing down and thinking about information — whether that information is true, false, or something in between.

STEP ONE: WHEN TO BE WORRIED

It’s hard to be vigilant all the time, but there are a few red flags that indicate something might be misleading.

The first step is honing your sense of when a given piece of content is too good (or bad) to be true. Once you start looking, you’ll notice specific subtypes of this content — like ragebait designed to get traffic from people’s anger, hyperpartisan appeals that twist the facts, or outright scams. The techniques are relatively common across different types of story, and they’re not hard to recognize.

Outside these specific cases, the general technique is almost stupidly simple: if a story grabs your attention for any reason, slow down and look closer.

Looking Deeper

You have a strong emotional reaction

A story seems totally ridiculous — or perfectly confirms your beliefs

You’re going to spend money because of it

You immediately want to amplify the story

FIRSTHAND SOURCES

Even if you don’t trust a particular outlet, you can often use their reporting to work back to primary sources, which you can use to fact-check what the outlet is saying or cast it in a different light. Here are some particular sources to look for:

A LEGAL FILING

Stories involving specific crimes are often drawn directly from legal filings, which are usually publicly available. You can often find the original documents as links in the article, or uploaded to third-party sites like Scribd, DocumentCloud, or CourtListener. Many of the filings only show allegations, but they’re a reliable picture of what the authorities think is happening in a particular case.

INTERVIEWS AND DIRECT QUOTES

Firsthand interviews are a core element of journalism. When possible, news outlets will print a person’s real name and quote them directly, and since most reputable journalists won’t risk their job by fabricating a quote or a source wholesale, those quotes are usually reliable. Outlets will generally only withhold names if identifying a person would endanger them, or put them in legal jeopardy.

LEAKED DOCUMENTS

Some of the most important stories in journalism come from leaked documents, which can reveal corporate wrongdoing or governmental misconduct. But less established outlets sometimes exaggerate what a particular video or document means, using original material as a license to make outlandish claims. It’s often useful to check the document to make sure it supports the article’s claims.

A PRESS RELEASE

Companies often exaggerate to make themselves look good, but if you want to confirm that a particular event or announcement really happened, a press release is a good way to make sure. You can find many of these statements on company and government agency websites, official social media accounts, and dedicated sites like PR Newswire.

STEP TWO: HOW TO CHECK OUT A LINK

Once you’ve decided to look more deeply at a story online, it’s time to figure out where and when it comes from. Internet news can work like a game of telephone: every time somebody reposts or rewrites something, there’s a chance that important details will get lost.

The first step in that process is finding the date of the original story — which is one of the most helpful pieces of information you can get. If the story’s being shared in a Facebook post or a tweet, click on the post and find its date, otherwise known as the timestamp. You should also look for the source of the relevant information. Sometimes a news story will explicitly cite its sources, whether that’s by making clear that the author performed firsthand research and interviews, or by linking to a press release or another news outlet. If it’s the latter, just click through to see where the information is coming from, and make sure to check the timestamp on that as well.

Sometimes, though, it’s unclear where news originated — a story might print an inflammatory quote without saying where or when it’s from, or a Twitter account might share a photo with a description that might be wrong. In those cases, do a quick search for more coverage and original sourcing, generally using a search engine like Bing, DuckDuckGo, or Google.

For more specific search tips, here are some of the strategies I use.

Looking Deeper

Check the verification

Look for names and keywords

Find survey and infographic sources

Search for quotes

Identify photos and videos

Consider how time-sensitive the story is

See if an old story is still accurate

WHY TIMESTAMPS MATTER

There’s a term called “context collapse” that’s very useful when discussing internet news. Popularized by scholar danah boyd, it describes how the internet “flattens multiple audiences into one” — if you’re browsing Twitter, for example, an offhand comment from your friend sits right alongside a statement from the president of the United States. Internet news suffers from its own variation of context collapse: no matter how far away or long ago a story happened, it can sound like it’s happening right now, in your neighborhood.

This can go horribly awry. In January 2019, a local TV station said law enforcement was looking for a human trafficking suspect around Waco, Texas. A radio station employee summarized the story with a more urgent headline — “Suspected Human Trafficker, Child Predator May Be in Our Area” — and posted it on Facebook.

The writer wanted to raise local awareness about a criminal on the loose. Instead, as Slate author Will Oremus explains, his story got out of control. It was shared hundreds of thousands of times across the country, likely by users who thought “our area” referred to their town instead of Texas. The suspect was apprehended soon after, and the article was updated. But people kept sharing the original post for weeks, because it sounded scary and urgent — apparently, too urgent to check and see if the danger was gone.

STEP THREE: HOW TO FIND THE CONTEXT

Some online disinformation is blatantly fake or misleading. But other stories are more subtly wrong. They might omit important details, blow small controversies out of proportion, or use legitimate news to attract people before feeding them bad information.

The key here is looking for gaps in a story, or mismatches between a story’s claims and its actual source material. These might be honest mistakes — like accounts sharing satirical news without realizing it. Or they might be a deliberate attempt to fool people.

There’s no step-by-step guide for understanding a story’s full context. But there are a few principles you can keep in mind.

Looking Deeper

Is it satire?

Who’s providing the information?

What’s the scale of the story?

If there’s an “outrage,” are people actually upset?

How do different news outlets present the story?

CROWDFUNDING CREDIBILITY

Lots of news outlets cover cool crowdfunded products on Kickstarter and Indiegogo, or mention that a story’s subject is raising money on GoFundMe. Before you give money to these campaigns, though, you should make sure they’re not unrealistic or scammy.

For product-based campaigns — like a board game, an indie movie, or a gadget — does the creator have relevant past experience? Does the funding goal seem way too low to create the product they’re describing? If they’ve raised money in a previous campaign, were the backers satisfied?

With personal campaigns, look for a connection between the campaign and the person who’s supposed to get the money — like a link in a news story or from the person’s known social media accounts. GoFundMe also offers more specific guidelines on its site.

In general, be cautious of crowdfunding projects that seem far more ambitious than mainstream products and services. If nobody — including the US government — has been able to build a giant border wall between the US and Mexico, there might be unforeseen difficulties that help explain that. And if big computing companies aren’t selling an ultra-thin, super-cheap laptop-tablet-phone hybrid, they may have realized it’s just a bad idea.

STEP FOUR: HOW TO WEIGH THE EVIDENCE

At this point, you probably understand the story you started with pretty well. You’re ready for the last, most subjective step of the process: deciding what it means. If you’ve been momentarily fooled by an Onion link or some other fake story — and seriously, it’s happened to all of us — this isn’t a tough step. If it’s a real piece of news, things get a lot harder.

You obviously don’t want to believe everything you see or read. But uncritically disbelieving everything is just as bad. Some news sources really are more consistently accurate than others. Some expert opinions are more trustworthy than your own amateur research. If you only believe things that you’ve checked with your own eyes, you’ll have an incredibly blinkered view of the world.

So the goal here isn’t to identify why a story is wrong. It’s to identify how the story works — which parts are complicated and subjective, which parts are probably accurate, and how much it should change your opinions or behavior.

Looking Deeper

Are important facts getting left out or distorted?

What’s the larger narrative?

What happens if you’re wrong?

Why share this story?

SOMETIMES EVERYBODY GETS THINGS WRONG

Sometimes, even the most well-regarded news sources release stories that aren’t true. In one extreme 2013 example, hackers took over the Associated Press Twitter account and claimed there were explosions at the White House. The story was quickly debunked, but for the first few minutes, the average reader could very reasonably assume the news was real.

More commonly, sources can lie, documents can be faked, and reporters can mishear quotes. Breaking news stories can be unreliable because nobody — including government officials and other authorities — knows what’s going on. Radio station WNYC published an excellent “Breaking News Consumer’s Handbook” for just this reason.

If you share stories on social media, there’s a good chance you’ll eventually post something that’s inaccurate or misleading, even if you’re diligently doing research.

That doesn’t mean that nothing is true or that every site is equally fake. You might see a bad story from an outlet that carefully outlines its sources, explains the context of an event, and corrects mistakes when it finds them. You’re much more likely to see a bad story from an outlet that posts context-free rumors and doesn’t explain where it’s getting information. If you read a site regularly over time, you’ll get a better sense of how much to trust it.

By the same token, you might occasionally believe something false if you’re careful. But if you don’t care about getting things right, it’ll happen much more often.

CONCLUSION

Solving misinformation and disinformation isn’t as simple as following a checklist. Getting too invested in the checklist can even backfire. Researcher danah boyd has described a dark side of media literacy education in schools — where asking students to think critically can cement a blanket assumption that news outlets are lying. And I don’t want to put all the responsibility for solving misinformation on individuals.

But here’s the thing: I think all this stuff is fun. Tracing the path of information online is one of my favorite activities, like solving a puzzle or directing an archaeological dig. I want to share that process with other people — and to make a case for why getting things right is more interesting and valuable than just confirming your beliefs or scoring points online.

And above all, I want to argue for treating investigation like a shovel, not a knife. Critical thinking shouldn’t just be a synonym for doubting or debunking something, and the point of research isn’t simply to poke holes in a story. It’s to understand the story better, or — if somebody is telling that story maliciously or incompetently — to get deep enough to find the truth.