How to Determine whether an Article is Reliable or Fake News

Fake News is an epidemic, not only in the United States, but globally as well. With a constant flow (or more realistically, a firehose) of information, how can we tell fact from fiction? In this article, I will give you some pointers to help you differentiate between a credible, evidence-backed article and Fake News.

Initial Questions to Ask

When you first look at an article or a claim, you want to ask yourself Who, What, Where, When, How, and most importantly WHY.

What was done, and who is the one who did it? Is there actual evidence that this happened, or is it speculation? How did this happen? Is it realistic that this is how it happened? Make sure you’re looking for hard evidence: photographs, emails, memos, and even then understand that this can be forged. Are these coming from a reliable source?

Where and when did this happen? You always want to check the dates, especially if it’s a scientific study. If an article is quoting a study from 10 years ago, chances are that more up to date evidence exists, and that the news outlet may have selected this particular study because it fits with the case they are trying to make.

It’s also impossible to find unbiased news these days, so make sure you’re constantly asking why: Why did the person or organization do this? Why is this media outlet reporting on it in this way? Understand that evidence of something happening is proof of existence, but it is not proof of motive.

Check Your Sources

I cannot overstate this enough. If a study is quoted and linked in an article, click through to see when the study was conducted, and by whom. As I stated above, study dates are extremely important, they are indicative of how reliable something is. If you’re not sure if there has been a more recent study on the subject matter, a quick Google search will help clear that up. If the study is conducted by a particular organization, look into that organization and try to understand their motives. For example, a study conducted by a cigarette company saying nicotine is safe have some pretty clear, biased motives.

If the study quoted by the article you are reading has been conducted by a reputable source and you can go in and view the study itself, chances are this article is more reliable. It’s too often that I see articles say “studies show” or “according to science” and never back up their arguments with the data source or a link. That should be a huge red flag as you read the news. In general, no scientist will be taken seriously by the broader scientific community if they do not provide their data to the rest of the community for peer-review. All news and information which is claiming to describe objective reality should be treated with the same level of scientific rigor.

If quotes or evidence are from “an anonymous source,” that is enough of a red flag to disregard the entire article. Yes, in certain situations people will want to protect themselves, however you want to read each article with a keen and discerning eye. Certainly give things a fair shot, however rather than blindly trust, you’ll want to trust but verify. When the verification fails though, don’t trust it. Point blank.

Constantly Verify the Reliability of Your News Sources

Even if the news source has a history of being reliable, you still want to constantly evaluate and ask these questions: Did they describe their own process of verifying that the evidence they are presenting is not forged? Do they actively talk about the measures they themselves took to ensure the validity of the evidence?

Keep in mind that a reliable and trustworthy source can also be lazy and unprofessional without expressing due diligence. Reliable sources shouldn’t be taken for granted that they are presenting objective information. In order to maintain their trust, they need to be constantly proving that they are indeed reliable.

Understanding how Science Plays a Role

Science uses evidence and repeatable results in order to verify objective reality. If you are reading information given without evidence — it’s not real. The beautiful thing about science is that it’s completely objective (if done right). Data is data, it does not have a narrative or a motive, but the news sources will twist the data to their satisfaction, selecting only the parts that help make their case. Therefore, be the smart consumer and read the entire study, not just the recap article. It’s more time consuming, but it will allow you to understand what’s going on with more certainty.

Lack of Evidence is Evidence

Without evidence, no one is able to scrutinize the information or verify the consistency of the narrative being presented by the information. Lack of evidence is in fact a form of evidence itself which creates the basis of trust between parties. Information that is presented to the public with evidence in hand fundamentally presents the information from a different starting point and trust level than information presented without any evidence at all, but rather purely relying on anonymous and unnamed sources providing the information.

Articles with evidence presented at hand offers the reader the opportunity to verify the claims and scrutinize the presented evidence, while articles without evidence only offers the reader the opportunity to scrutinize the claims, which forces the burden of looking for any evidence to support the presented claims onto the reader.

Here is a small sample of controversial topics and narratives that have missing evidence, but plenty of claims:

Russian government shot down flight MH-17:

• Evidence needed: US Military and Ukrainian Military data verifying the shoot down. Specific proof such as radar data, high-definition satellite images of positions of Russian weaponry used to shoot down the plane, etc.

Las Vegas Shooting:

• Evidence needed: Unedited security camera footage from every camera in the area including the hotel itself.

The DNC got hacked by Russians:

• Evidence needed: Claim of getting hacked by a specific party is usually an unverifiable claim due to the nature of hacking and the ability for hackers to use techniques that make it impossible to determine who done it. However, possibilities do exist. The most direct form of evidence to support such a claim would be for the hacker to announce that they did it. Another way would be for an inside whistleblower to come out with the evidence of involvement in the hacking, provide information about the hacking process and timelines of how it was done. However, claims are also possible to be disproven with data that paints a different narrative. With respect to this specific claim, KimDotCom has claimed he has evidence to prove otherwise.

The United States is financially solvent and the economy is doing great:

• Evidence needed: Federal Reserve Audit

My hope for those standing up to the Fake News problem

I hope this article inspires you to take pride in being critical and asking tough questions to people in charge. Stick with your curiosity and ask the questions a scientist would ask. We do have the power to get out of this fake news paradigm, and now’s time to exercise this power.

My hope is that in the near future, we will communicate together and utilize social media to get real with each other, teaching each other investigation techniques, talking about difficult topics, and confronting and challenging our own biases and ingrained belief systems — that’s what real social is all about.

We can fix the fake news problem. We can do this!