When Old News is Fake News
Former President Trump DID NOT make a surprise visit to Switzerland aboard a US Marine Corps helicopter.
Social media is a cesspool of fake news and misinformation because users allow it to be. Its platforms make distributing content from disreputable sources quick and easy because they intentionally lack the controls that legitimate and authoritative news outlets employ to verify facts and filter out falsehoods. Instead, social media companies expect users to adjudicate the veracity of content they see before sharing it with others. Either out of ignorance, malice, or amusement, common users will generally choose the irrational dopamine drip of likes and shares over evidentiary truth when judging social media postings.
Repackaging old news is a common tactic of fake news purveyors. Similar to the method of using facts to legitimize fantasies, repackaging provides an opportunity to manipulate an actual event to serve a prejudicial purpose while playing on biases to gain attention.
Lesson Learned: Extraordinary public news events are never exclusive.
A deep analysis from the Agence France-Presse (AFP) Fact Check service examined how a fake news purveyor repurposed old footage of past event to provide false…
