Supporting fact checkers in the fight against misinformation

Since 2016, our mission at Our.News has been to fight misinformation in all its forms. With the recent infodemic of misinformation surrounding topics like Covid-19, the Black Lives Matter protests, and the upcoming 2020 elections — the critical work of fact checkers is more important than ever. In that spirit, we’re launching new initiatives to directly show our support.

Background

Our.News is a tech startup that has created a global factchecking platform called Newstrition— which provides Nutrition Labels for News attached to all news and content online. Primarily intended to help regular news consumers quickly determine the credibility of any content online, the platform also provides powerful tools that fact checkers can leverage.

Grant Program and benefits available to Fact Checkers

Starting today, the following features on our platform will be entirely free for the members of the global fact checking community who are verified signatories of IFCN’s Code of Principles.

1. Free Access to our Founding Memberships. This will enable fact checkers to see real-time public opinion data generated on our platform — for example, which authors and publishers do the public trust the most, or the least? which do the public see as the most, or least accurate? etc.
2. Free Access to our Global API. All features of our platform are available for programmatic access via our REST API. This includes our database of factchecks, claims, news articles, authors, publishers, article sources, public opinion scores, and more. This can be used for real-time or automated integrations of our data across any media property.
3. Free Integration into our API. Include the results of your fact checks automatically within our system. This way, the public will be able to see links to your fact checks directly within our Newstrition labels, driving traffic from Newstrition directly to your content.
4. $25,000 in Cash Grants. We’re providing direct cash grants, each valued between $1000-$5000, to fact checking organizations who commit to integrating our API or data into their website, fact-checks, or apps. In addition, grantees will receive unlimited, free development support from our in-house software developers to assist with the integration.

Please see below for more details, or click here to apply.

Features of our Global API

Our API allows for direct programmatic access via our REST API. This can be used to access our database of factchecks, claims, news articles, authors, publishers, article sources, and public opinion scores.

Here’s an example of several helpful features for fact checkers:

1. GET Fact Checks based on URL. Pass any URL to our API, and it will return a list of factchecks (from IFCN signatories) that have been performed either on that URL directly, or on the claims made within it.
2. GET Fact Checks based on a Claim. Pass any Claim string to our API, and it will return a list of factchecks (from IFCN signatories) that have been performed on the claims, along with a matching confidence score.
3. Rate a URL or a Claim. Pass any URL or Claim to our API, along with a link to your factcheck and your desired label (ie. “False”, or “True”, or “Analysis Available”, etc) and it will appear in our Newstrition labels.
4. GET Public Opinion on any URL or Polling Topic. See the aggregated, de-identified results of our social polling based on any URL or opinion topic, from any geographic location, and filtered by any demographic.

Detail on the Cash Grants

We believe the future of fact checking — and the ability for society to win the fight against misinformation — requires the combination of professional fact checking organizations, with advanced technology in support of their efforts.

To help accomplish this, we’re offering direct cash grants of between $1000-$5000 to fact checkers who commit to integrating our API or data into their website, fact-checks, or apps. In addition, grantees will receive unlimited, free development support from our in-house software developers.

There’s no requirements for precisely how or where to do this integration, and we’re open to exploring all ideas and proposals. Here’s several examples of potentially eligible integrations:

• Display any of our data automatically on your website or apps
• Integrate our Newstrition labels directly on your fact checks
• Allow us to automatically integrate your fact checks into Newstrition
• Reference and directly link sources in your fact checks to Newstrition
• Create a white-labeled version of our Newstrition mobile app or browser extensions, featuring your branding, content, and fact checks.
• Suggest a new feature for Newstrition and help us bring it to fruition

The Grant program is subject to our Grant Terms and Conditions.

Click here to apply for a Grant, or for other benefits for fact checkers.

Thank you for all you’re doing!

Richard Zack
Founder, CEO/CTO
Our.News