How to spot fake news and avoid being tricked by it
By: Callum Denault
Published on: April 15th, 2024
In the digital age, we can access a wide range of information at our fingertips.
We can actively seek out information via search engines like Google or scroll on TikTok and encounter information delivered through reels. Or we can go the traditional route and read a newspaper or magazine to learn about the latest events.
However, not all information presented on these communication channels is accurate. Some of it is fake news.
Fake news is fake or misleading information presented as news. This information has no verifiable facts, sources or quotes to support the claims being made.
Keep reading to learn more about how to spot fake news and how to avoid being tricked by it.
Misinformation and disinformation
Fake news takes various forms, from exaggerated lies to completely made-up events. There are generally two types of fake news: misinformation and disinformation.
While both are types of fake news, the difference between misinformation and disinformation is the intent of whoever is spreading it.
Misinformation refers to mistakes, such as treatments for the COVID-19 virus that do not actually work. Usually, misinformation is spread by people who mean well but either lack knowledge of the subject at hand or do not properly double-check their sources.
Disinformation, on the other hand, involves lies that are spread with a purpose. That purpose is often to sway political opinions or trick people into falling for a scam.
Regardless of whether it is spread maliciously or by accident, fake news is a growing problem. It is important to be mindful of the information you’re consuming.
The damage fake news causes
The consequences of fake news can be severe, especially because many people have been subjected to falling for false claims presented as factual. One survey found that 89 per cent of Canadians reported having been tricked by fake news on at least one occasion. This survey also found that Facebook was the leading source of fake news.
Fake news stories tend to thrive during political elections, mainly because this is when the bad-faith actors behind disinformation can do the most damage with their lies. Artificial intelligence (AI) technology can be used to make images, videos, and sounds that did not actually happen.
In Slovakia, AI was used to potentially change the results of a national election. A deepfake voice recording of Michal Simecka, leader of the Progressive Slovakia party, was released a day before the election. This fake voice recording was presented as proof that the political candidate spoke to a journalist about buying out voters. Simecka lost the election, and whether the now-debunked audio file was part of the reason for this is up to debate.
Fake news can also pose cyber security concerns. Fake news articles can be entry points for hackers to try and steal your information. A cyber breach can be serious and could compromise confidential data such as your banking information.
How social media spreads fake news
Websites like Facebook and Twitter/X are major sources of both misinformation and disinformation. This is largely because many of us actively use social media on a daily basis, making it a frontrunner for how we access news. It has been found that 53 per cent of individuals get at least a portion of their news from social media.
There also aren’t enough policies and protections against fake news being published and circulated on these platforms. Or policies and protections have been slow to roll out.
A report found that Facebook could have prevented billions of views on pages that spread misinformation about the 2020 American election. The platform later released an update that changed its algorithm, but it didn’t come in time to prevent misinformation and disinformation from being shared.
CBC reported that experts are worried websites such as Facebook will continue to be a major source of fake political news during Canada’s 2024 federal election. This is because social media sites are designed around engagement rather than preventing posts made to interfere in political elections. These platforms are more focused on ensuring users are spending a bunch of time scrolling through posts rather than identifying and preventing fake news.
Fake news websites
It is also important to be on the lookout for fake news websites. Fake news websites are websites that are designed to replicate actual webpages for legitimate news publications such as CTV News. This is another way that disinformation gets spread.
Newsday, The New York Times, and The Washington Post are among publications that have many imitators pretending to be them through fake websites. These copycat websites usually have domain names that are misspelled versions of the real thing, such as The Nrw York Times.
This strategy is known as typosquatting. Outside of spreading fake news, typosquatters may lure in visitors for even more nefarious reasons, such as giving viruses to anyone who clicks on their website.
How to spot fake news
While fake news is a critical concern, there are ways to identify it and protect yourself from it.
Fake media, like deepfakes, usually has signs that you can look for to confirm its validity. Because AI creates images based on existing content, there are errors in how it draws people. Telling signs of an AI-generated person or deepfaked face include unnatural asymmetry, especially around ears or jewelry, and how their hands are shaped.
Audio deepfakes are harder to tell apart, with people generally only recognizing them with a 57 per cent success rate. The robotic qualities of faked speech may be very subtle, especially if the audio quality itself is not very good, such as if it sounds like the person was talking on a phone call.
The best course of action is to be cautious and not reveal any personal information. If it is a legitimate organization phoning you, such as your bank or a government agency, they will conduct verification processes.
There are also a variety of fact-checking websites, including factcheck.org and snopes.com, that can be used to see if major stories are true or not.
Additionally, like all forms of fake news, there are telltale signs that a website is not real. Typosquattors tend to put a lot of pop-ups on their websites, ranging from advertisements to surveys asking for personal information.
Furthermore, these websites can be avoided by refusing to click on any weblink provided through an email or social media account. Real news sites can be visited simply by looking them up through a search engine such as Google and verifying the URL.
Fake news can be scary, but as long as you are cautious and on the lookout, you can protect yourself from falling victim to it.