The Internet is flooded with a wide variety of news; That can be overwhelming because you don’t know if everything you read is true or false. Then you will surely ask yourself, How can I identify false news published on the internet?, this post will give you some tips that will help you identify the false news that you find on the internet.
Why is fake news published on the internet so dangerous?
Fake news, or Fake News, is increasing on the internet and the use of social networks such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have turned fake news into a viral phenomenon that has caused havoc. And this is because the creators of this news are unscrupulous people who want to transmit destructive information in order to do harm. Fake news is part of the dangers that exist in social networks and that are avoidable.
This type of news is written deliberately in order to impact users and generate some type of reaction in a specific period; such as economic, political, social crisis or electoral campaigns and are sometimes spread by false profiles on social networks. Some of the dangers generated by these news are:
- They are responsible for discrediting an individual, company, religion, governments or a country.
- Deliberately misinforming people to create confusion, cause scandals or alarms.
- Influence users to make a decision that favors a company, political party or some doctrine.
- They serve to increase racial, religious or social hatred.
- They endanger the security of a city or nation.
- Internet users can be victims of theft; because some of this news is infected with malware designed to infect computers and steal personal data.
- Impersonate genuine fonts.
- Earn a large number of visits on the news portals.
This fake news has a very clear purpose, which is to shape the way users act, think and decide; This false news penetrates the minds of credulous people who do not stop to be critical and wonder if what they read is true or false.
How can I identify fake news published on the Internet?
- Read the whole news never read just the headline; Fake news headlines are designed to attract the attention of users, which is why they are often eye-catching and captivating headlines. A detailed reading of the news will help you to have a clear idea if it is true or false because sometimes the title does not match the content of the news.
- Conduct a news investigation; For example, search your web browser for information about the author, the medium or website that published it, it will even be useful to search the title of the news on the web to confirm if the news appears on other reliable portals.
- If the news is anonymous, they have no date, and no source begins to suspect it may be false.
- You can also Google image the photograph or image that has the news to verify that it is authentic and that it has not been adulterated or stolen from some old news.
- Check the date it is very common for fake news to be from a past event and republish it in the present to give the impression that it is a current event.
- If it is a news received by WhatsApp, Telegram or a similar application, check if it has authorship or a link that confirms what they have sent you. If it is an audio, listen to it in full to see if the information is coherent.
- Ask the person who sent you where the information came from. Since many times this news is actually junk mail or spam.
- Check the URL to confirm that the news is from a trusted site, as many fake news sites pretend to be official sites. Therefore, it is important that you learn how to know if a web page is false or true.
- Pay attention to the little details; fake news is misspelled, oddly designed, capitalized, and exclaimed.
- Use the platforms dedicated to detecting fake news such as Maldito Bulo, El Tragabulos or The Trust Project.
- They give a tabloid approach to information.
Before sharing a news item, think and use common sense, since on the internet you can find a lot of information that may be true but there are also false ones that have a malicious objective within society; so make sure that what you share is true and reliable news.