Fake news and disinformation: the fact-check game
How made-up stories are built, why they spread so fast and how you check them.
Why made-up stories are faster
A study by MIT analysed millions of tweets: false news spreads on social media faster and further than true news. Not because bots are so powerful, but because people share it. Made-up stories are more exciting, and excitement gets shared.
Disinformation is spread on purpose, misinformation is a mistake. For you, at the moment you share it, it makes no difference: you spread both just as far.
The usual building blocks
- Real picture, wrong context: the photo is real, but six years old and from another country
- Numbers without context: "500 cases!" without saying of what, where, over what period
- Quote without a source: supposedly said, never proven
- Real source, twisted message: the study exists but says something different
- Urgency: "Share this before it gets deleted!"
- Missing sender: no name, no legal notice, no date
Your four-step checking tool
- Check the sender: who is this, does the site really exist?
- Check the date: is the story from today or from 2019?
- Cross-check: do other independent sources report the same thing?
- Reverse image search: upload it to Google Lens or TinEye and see where it appeared before
Reverse image search is the sharpest tool of all and takes ten seconds. Upload a screenshot and you will see when the picture first appeared.
Who helps with checking
- Correctiv, dpa fact check, AFP fact check: German-language fact checks
- Mimikama: mainly checks viral content from social media
- Google Lens / TinEye: reverse image search
Five headlines, real or made up. Unlock the game, let the students tap their answers individually, and then go through the reasoning on the board, especially the cases where the class got it wrong.
The teacher runs this game in class.
How do you recognise a story that is probably made up?
More than one answer may be correct.
Likes are not a sign of quality, made-up posts often collect especially many.