Fact Checking
Fact Checking
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FullFact.org Fact-Checking Page
Fact-checks from around the world on a variety of breaking topics.
Junkipedia
This free tool tracks public social media accounts across several platforms. Built by investigative journalists as part of the National Conference on Citizenship, a Congressionally-chartered nonprofit.
AFP: Fighting Disinformation: AFP Shares Tools in Video
FACT-CHECKING RESOURCES
Journalist’s Toolbox Coronavirus and COVID-19 Fact-Checking Resources
Google Fact Check Explorer
Look up and see a timeline of current fact-checks on news stories.
Google News Initiative Verification Tools Course
This course shows you time-saving methods to verify the authenticity and accuracy of images, videos and reports that you find in social media and elsewhere online. Tools used: Google Search, Google Maps, Google Earth, Google Translate.
First Draft News
Dozens of fact-checking tools and resources.
First Draft News: Verification Toolbox
FirstDraftNews.org: Essential Guide to Responsible Reporting in an Age of Information Disorder
First Draft News: Verification Training Course
A free one-hour online course to help detect misinformation.
Craig Silverman’s Verification and Digital Investigations Resources
Essential plugins and tools for general OSINT/online research work.
FactCheck.org
Dozens of resources from the Annenberg Public Policy Center.
First Draft News: Covering Coronavirus – Privacy and Security Tips for Journalists
First Draft News: Verifying Online Information — The Absolute Essentials
Bellingcat: Beginner’s Guide to Social Media Verification
Knight Science Journalism at MIT Fact-Checking Project
OSINTCurious
Lots of information, tutorials, webcast on finding and verifying information.
We Verify Browser Plug-in
Fact-checking plug-in for Google Chrome
The MuckRock/MisinfoCon Police Misinformation Tipsheet
GIJN Guide to Fact-Checking Investigative Stories
GIJN: Simple Tips for Verifying if a Tweet Screenshot Is Real or Fake
ScamSearch
Global scam database. Search for reported identities related to online scammers by crypto address, username, email, or phone number.
Six Tools to Help With Geolocation
First Draft: Fake News. It’s Complicated
Politifact: How to Avoid Falling for Fake News
PEN America: Combatting Protest Disinformation
ONA: COVID-19 Misinformation Playbook
GIJN: Deepfake Satellite Imagery
How it’s done and what to watch for.
ClaimReview Project
The review usually takes less than 30 seconds. Fact-checkers enter a few basic details about an article such as the URL, the person and claim being checked, and the conclusion.
AccountAnalysis.app
Track Twitter timeline activity and find out when an account is most active. Track RTs, hashtags used and tweet times.
Tinfoleak
Twitter account info, including devices and operating systems used. Lack locations, hashtags, mentions and likes.
Twitter: 5 Tips for Spotting Misinformation on Twitter
GIJN: A Global Guide to Initiatives Tackling Fake News
Nordis: Fact-Checking Tools Database
The database, which was conceived at a meeting during Global Fact 9 in Oslo, contains a list of tools connected to various parts of the fact-checking process, including the identification and verification of claims, as well as the distribution of fact-checks. The database was compiled by NORDIS member Laurence Dierickx (UiB) by joining a labelled dataset collected by the SCAM project at Oslo Metropolitan University with a dataset collected by the NORDIS UiB team.
Centralops.net/co
Website owner details. Retrieve names, ABNs, emails.
YouTube Metadata
Grabs singular details about a video and its uploader, playlist and creator/channel. Submit a link to a video, playlist or channel. Has reverse image/video search built-in.
GIJN: Fact-Checking & Verification Guide
Nieman Journalism Lab: What Makes an Election Rumor Go Viral? Look at These 10 Factors
These videos were created by the SPJ Education Committee. Here’s a playlist of all of its training videos.
Junkipedia
This free tool tracks public social media accounts across several platforms. Built by investigative journalists as part of the National Conference on Citizenship, a Congressionally-chartered nonprofit.
IJNET: 13 Tips for Investigating Political Disinformation
IJNET: Environmental Reporters Face Disinformation Threats in China’s Restrictive Political Climate
The Media Manipulation Casebook
GIJN: Comprehensive Fact-Checking Guide
FullFact.org Fact-Checking Page
Fact-checks from around the world on a variety of breaking topics.
Geolocation Estimation
Helps locate geotagged images on a map.
Verification Handbook for Investigative Reporting
Get Your Facts Straight: The Basics of Fact-Checking
A fact-checking toolkit from Deepak Adhikari, the editor of South Asia Check.
AFP: Fighting Disinformation: AFP Shares Tools in Video
MIT: Detect Deep-Fakes
Works much like Spot the Troll does with spotting fake Twitter accounts, this tool gives you examples of deep-fake photos and videos and breaks down how you tell which one is fake.
GIJN: Video Resources for Mapping, Satellites, Storytelling, Testing, Tracking, and Disinformation
Verification Handbook, Vol. II
From Craig Silverman, this guide gives you tools to verify digital content for emergency coverage.
Media Manipulation CasebookFrom Harvard’s Shorenstein Center, this digital research platform linking together theory, methods, and practice for mapping media manipulation and disinformation campaigns. This resource is intended for researchers, journalists, technologists, policymakers, educators, and civil society organizers who want to learn about detecting, documenting, describing, and debunking misinformation.
Verification Handbook, Vol. I
From Craig Silverman, this guide gives you tools to verify digital content for emergency coverage.
Flashpoint: OSINT Tools Library
Jimpl
Free online EXIF viewer and remover. It’s useful to journalists for fact-checking, image location search, photojournalism. There are few other similar websites available, but some of them lack a secure HTTPS connection or the ability to remove EXIF data, not just view it.
SunCalc
Lets users analyze the position of shadows and the sun at any given time and date, at any given location.
Pimeyes
Facial recognition reverse image search.
BBC Africa Eye: Digital Forensics Dashboard
A collation of some essential tools tailored to journalists using open source intelligence (OSINT) to carry out investigations.
GIJN: How to Use SunCalc to Geolocate Photos and Videos
SciCheck
FactCheck.org’s SciCheck feature focuses exclusively on false and misleading scientific claims that are made by partisans to influence public policy. It was launched in January 2015 with a grant from the Stanton Foundation. The foundation was founded by the late Frank Stanton, president of CBS for 25 years, from 1946 to 1971.
SIFT (The Four Moves)
Washington State professor Mike Caufield lays out an approach to fact-checking the news.
The Journalist’s Resource: Covering Public Officials Who Spread Misinformation
Video: How to OSINT?
A YouTube channel with tutorials on how to use OSINT for fact checking and verification of viral videos or pictures.
First Draft News: A Guide to Prebunking: A Promising Way to Inoculate Against Misinformation
Stanford FSI | Cyber – How to Responsibly Report on Hacks and Disinformation
The Media Manipulation Casebook
A research platform that advances knowledge of misinformation and disinformation and their threats to democracy, public health and security.
EXIF Tool
Read, write and edit meta information in photos.
Video: Journalism and the Pandemic: The Disinfodemic
ICFJ webinar on disinformation during the pandemic.
Reuters News Training Course: Manipulated Media
Twitter List: Disinformation Essentials
Indiana University Misinformation Tools
Created by the school’s Observatory on Social Media.
Videos: Online Investigative Tips for Journalists
This playlist provides quick tutorials in online tools from AFP journalists. Go back in time using maps, learn how to use your phone to read foreign languages, search the web using a photo and more. Videos featuring specific investigations take you inside AFP’s bureaus around the world where journalists put some of these tools to use every day.
GIJN Tipsheet: How to Monitor Social Media for Misinformation
CoVaxxy
Visualizing the relationship between COVID-19 vaccine adoption and online (mis)information. From Indiana University’s Observatory on Social Media.
Who Posted What?
A free, non-public Facebook keyword search for people who work in the public interest. It allows you to search keywords on specific dates.
Verification and Digital Verification Resources
DNSlytics
Learn everything about a domain name, IP address or a provider.
Who Posted What
Non-public Facebook keyword search.
News Media Alliance: Journalists’ Tips for Avoiding Fake News
Nitter: Anonymous Twitter Search
PIMEyes Facial Recognition Search Tool
Google Advanced Search Operators
First Draft News: Election 2020 Dashboard
Daily snapshots of what its investigative team finds online.
Stanford Internet Observatory
Works to fight misinformation and disinformation.
GIJN: New Technology and Online Resources to Conduct Investigations With Old Photos
Kevin Nguyen’s OSINT Links for Ukraine and Australia
ShareChecklist.uk.gov
The Cabinet Office of the Government of the United Kingdom reminds us that things online are not always what they seem. They supply this checklist to use before you share.
Washington Post: Ukraine Visual Forensics – How Do Journalists Know Photos and Videos Are Real?
The Atlantic: What is the Russian Internet Research Agency?
Read about the origins of Russia’s Internet Research Agency, which spreads disinformation, creates troll accounts, etc.
WhoTwi
Just enter a Twitter ID to run a simple analysis. Analyze friends, tweet trends, follows and followers.
AccountAnalysis.app
This tool enables you to evaluate Twitter accounts. For example how automated they are, how many Retweets they post, or which websites they link to most often.
AFP Course: Digital Investigation Techniques
ExifTool
A platform-independent Perl library plus a command-line application for reading, writing and editing meta information in a variety of files, including photos. It’s great for extracting information about a photo from its meta data and is useful for fact-checking.
10 Digital Forensic Tips from Bellingcat
Politifact Guide to Fake News Sites
Snopes: Field Guide to Fake News Sites
Faktisk
Fact-checking collaboration between Norwegian news organizations.
CrossCheck
French fact-check org that’s part of First Draft News.
StopFake.org
Verify and refute disinformation and propaganda about events in Ukraine being circulated in the media.
Finding the Truth Among Fakes
Fact-checking guide from Al Jazeera.
Harvard’s Journalist’s Resource: Fake News and Fact-Checking – Seven Studies You Should Know About
Fake News, Misleading News, Biased News: Fact-Checking Sites and Plug-Ins
From HCC Libraries
Reveal: Image Verification Assistant
Upload images to verify them. Tool is built by a joint team of engineers and investigators from CERTH-ITI and Deutsche Welle, trying to build a comprehensive tool for media verification on the Web. The Media Verification Assistant features a multitude of image tampering detection algorithms plus metadata analysis, GPS Geolocation, EXIF Thumbnail extraction and integration with reverse image search via Google.
Reveal Image Verification Assistant
Uses a variety of techniques to verify a photo and show if it’s been doctored. Upload or link to a photo. Does a good job of explaining the science of digital image forensics.
Soch Fact Check
Fact-checking website from Pakistan, launched in 2020, only IFCN signatory, and fighting to gain traction in an environment rife with information disorder.
Snopes2.com Urban Legends Reference Pages
Think a story or tip might be made up? Use this page to search for some urban legends.
Internet Troll and Disinformation Quiz
International Fact-Checking Network: Online Training Course
First Draft News: How to Analzye Facebook Data for Misinformation Trends
Coornet
Good for fact-checking misinformation and disinformation campaigns across multiple platforms. Given a set of URLs, this package detects coordinated link sharing behavior (CLSB) and outputs the network of entities that performed such behavior.
Center for Media Engagement: Gaining Trust in TV News
The Center for Media Engagement examined how TV news stations can increase trust by including certain elements in a story.
LinkFacts
A mind-mapping tool, free within certain limits, that is particularly efficient in documenting journalistic research. The sources, references and resources can be linked in an easy to build graph and this valuable information, unlike footnotes will become alive as the readers can click through, access the resources directly and like, comment, share and even suggest extensions to the maintainer.
FreePress.net: Building Community Trust in Newsrooms
A great guide on how to be inclusive when practicing journalism. Great tips.
Tow Center: A Guide to Open Source Intelligence and Hostile Communities
Newsroom Transparency Tracker
A tool that equips you to assess the transparency of leading national and regional media outlets by surfacing the policies, practices, and people behind the news. The Tracker encourages media outlets to be accountable to the public and empowers the public to make informed choices about the news they watch, listen to, and read.
First Draft News: Newsgathering and Monitoring on the Social Web
Teaching Students to Earn Trust
Resources from Joy Mayer with TrustingNews.org.
Stalk Scan
Scan Facebook profiles to see where people are posting.
WCSJ: Fact-Checking in the Age of Misinformation (2017)
Sourceful: Crap Detection Resources
Listing of fact-checking tools.
Veracity App
Reverse verification app.
For more training videos, visit our YouTube page.
The Journalist’s Resource Tipsheet: Don’t Say ‘Prove’: How to Report on the Conclusiveness of Research Findings
This tipsheet from Harvard explains why it’s almost always inaccurate for a journalist to report that a research study or group of studies proves anything. It also offers reporters and editors tips for getting it right.
TedEd: How to Spot a Misleading Graphic
Washington Post: Ukraine Visual Forensics – How Do Journalists Know Photos and Videos Are Real?
Who Is Behind This Website?
An excellent set of tips and tools to track the source of a website.
Keyhole Social Media Account Analytics
Use account tracking data to measure and grow your social media accounts and spy on competitors. Social Media Account Analytics for Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.
Brookings: What are Readers Likely to Believe in a Fact-Check
Nieman Lab: Hyperpartisan Sites Posing as Local News Sites
Use this map to see if some are located near you.
FindClone
Reverse image/facial recognition.
ICFJ: Nine Tools for Verifying Images
FFmpeg
A complete, cross-platform solution to record, convert and stream audio and video.
GIJN: Three Quick Ways to Verify Images on a Smartphone
Before and After the Vote: A Journalism Resource Database
From Free Press, this database database features more than 100 resources that address ways to: Cover white supremacy and white-supremacist violence; report on police, protests, uprisings and demonstrations, detect and combat misinformation and disinformation; produce coverage that upholds election integrity; protect journalists’ physical safety and secure digital communications.
AfricaCheck: How to Spot Fakes and Hoaxes Online
NY Times: Satellite Images and Shadow Analysis: How The Times Verifies Eyewitness Videos
VerExif
Pictures taken by digital cameras can contain a lot of information, like data, time and camera used. But last generation cameras and phones can add the GPS coordinates of the place where it was taken, making it a privacy hazard. You can be showing your home’s location to the world. Using this tool you can view and remove exif data online of your pictures without downloading any program.
Tips on Investigating Disinformation Networks from BuzzFeed’s Craig Silverman
From his session at the Global Investigative Journalism Conference.
Freedom Forum: Quick Guide to Spotting Fake News
GeoSearchTool
Type in an address or location with a time frame and find videos uploaded from that area. Great for fact-checking locations and crowdsourcing.
Washington Post: Fact-Checkers Guide to Manipulated Video
WatchFramebyFrame.com
Can be used to play YouTube and Vimeo videos frame by frame, to see any inconsistencies in content.
Trusting News: How to Build Trust with your TV Audience
First Draft News: Guides to Verify Photos and Videos
GIJN: How to Spot Deep Fake Videos
ICFJ: A Short Guide to the History of “Fake News” and Disinformation
Global Investigative Journalism Network: Fact-Checking and Verification
Bellingcats Digital Forensics Tools
Open source verification and investigative tools.
TrustingNews.org
Updated in spring 2019, the site includes a searchable database shares the best examples of what has worked for media outlets to earn trust from readers. It’s organized around the problems we know you’re facing and allows you to filter around these themes and drill down to get even more specific help.
Journalism.co.uk: Prepare Yourself for the Next Viral Hoax
Check out this advice to make sure you are prepared for the next viral hoax.
First Draft News: Understanding Information Disorder
How to Monitor Social Media for Misinformation
Global Investigative Journalism Network: Advanced Guide to Verifying Video Content
Amnesty International: YouTube DataViewer
Get a video’s thumbnails and do a reverse image search on them in one click.
American Press Institute Fact-Checking Resources
Hoaxy
Visualize the spread of claims and fact checking.
ViewDNS.info
A reverse lookup of WhoIs.net. You can locate a site by registrant.
Washington Post: Fact-Checker’s Guide
API: Nine Tips for Covering Election Misinformation
For more training videos, visit our YouTube page.
Washington Post: Fact-Checker Tool
Media Cloud
Create an instant analysis of how digital news media covers your topic of interest. You can see attention to the issue, the language used, and the people and places mentioned. Great for fact-checking claims about what the media is/is not covering. Doesn’t cover social media post but mentions in website posts.
Claimbuster
Fact-checking algorithm from Duke University that monitors CNN transcripts for claims that are fact-checkable. Read this paper on how it works.
Newsworthy
Via CJR: Developed at Journalism++ in Sweden, this system monitors open government data and identifies statistically interesting leads based on anomalies, outliers, and trends in numerical data streams such as real estate prices, weather patterns, and crime reports, among others.
InVid Video Verification Plug-in
Browser plug-in that assists in debunking fake videos.
Duke Reporter’s Lab: Fact-Checking Sites/Efforts
The Trust Project: Transparency Tools for Journalists
Tools for Trust
Lists of tools for building trust with your audience from WeAreHearken’s Jennifer Brandel, Mark Little, Aron Pilhofer and more.
These videos were created by the SPJ Education Committee. Here’s a playlist of all of its training videos.
InVid
Chrome and Firefox plug-in that verifies photos and video.
Checkology
Classroom resources for news literacy and fact-checking from The News Literacy Project.
National Association for Media Literacy Education
Resources galore. Follow on Twitter at @medialiteracyed.
First Draft News Journalist Guides
Guides to social sources, copyright law and covering trauma.
Verification Junkie
This tool from Josh Stearns centralizes several social media verification tools in one place. Great for reporting and fact-checking on deadline.
FirstDraftNews: The 5 sources of fake news everyone needs to look out for online
Indiana University: Tips and Resources for Fact-Checking and Detecting Fake News
Hoaxy
Track where and how fake news is spreading over social channels. Built by Indiana University.
A Field Guide to Fake News
Produced by First Draft News and the Public Data Lab.
CUNY: Fact-Checking, Verification and Fake News Guide
Duke Reporter’s Lab Fact-Checking Tools
The Trust Project: Transparency Tools for Journalists
Checkology
Classroom resources for news literacy and fact-checking from The News Literacy Project.
Custom Writing: Fact-Checking Your Writing
A nice list of basic tips and tools.
National Association for Media Literacy Education
Resources galore. Follow on Twitter at @medialiteracyed.
First Draft News Journalist Guides
Guides to social sources, copyright law and covering trauma.
Check
Created by Meedan, this tool helps you verify breaking news.
Public List of Fake News Sites
GIJN: Advanced Guide on Verifying Video Content
Sensity.ai Facial Recognition
Use AI to fact-check/search photos.
Foto Forensics
Put in an image URL or drag a photo into this free tool to see how much editing has been done to it. Great for fact-checking fake photos.
Forensically
Similar to Foto Forensics, it breaks down meta-data and other parts of photos for fact-checking.
IPVM
Image forensics tool. Use to fact-check images by confirming locations.
Travel Time Map
Estimates travel time by driving, walking, public transport, etc. Good for confirming timelines in investigative or crime stories.
Rapid Tables
Load in a photo and measure pixels to confirm sizes. Great for IDing weapons or verifying shadow lengths. Credit to Tom Jarvis for sharing this.
Jeffrey’s Exif Viewers
Review a photo’s metadata. Helps with verification.
Google Images: Reverse Image Search
Fact-check photos and see when they were first posted.
Video: How to Use Google Reverse Image Search
Tineye
Similar to Google Image search. Fact-check photos.
Foller.me
Social backgrounding tool helpful for fact-checking. Gives you rich insights into any public twitter profile. Data about topics, mentions, hashtags, followers, location and more.
Pipl.com
Find info on the person behind the email address, social username or phone number. Great for verifying account legitimacy.
PeekYou.com
Free people search tool.
Spokeo.com
Search people by name, phone, address and social media account.
Who.is
Type in a domain name, IP address or person’s name to find site information or who owns/registered what online.
Graph.tips for Facebook
Track down a Facebook ID and search for information/posts by that person in FB.
IntelTechniques Search Tools
Works similar to Graph.tips. Searches Facebook and other social media for peoples’ accounts.
Trusting News: Data on Trust in Media (2022)
Slideshow from Joy Mayer with data and studies on how trust has wanted in news media and how it can be fixed.
WikiMapia
Use for fact-checking locations of photos and videos shared on social media.
Spatial Journalism: Using Geo Tools for Fact-Checking
Resources and tips from Amy Schmitz Weiss.
First Draft News Fact-Checking Resources
5 Tools for Verifying YouTube Video
Indiana University: Tips and Resources for Fact-Checking and Detecting Fake News
FirstDraftNews: Understanding the Fake News Ecosystem
Hoaxy
Track where and how fake news is spreading over social channels. Built by Indiana University.
Public List of Fake News Sites
Truth or Fiction?
This site takes “rumor mill” e-mails we all receive and determines if they are true or false. There is a good list of Attack on America information.
How Can Newsrooms Verify Video from Eyewitnesses?
Great set of resources from First Draft News.
Duke Reporter’s Lab Fact-Checking Tools
Duke Reporters Lab: Fact-Checking Efforts Around the World (map)
Purportal: Urban Legends Portal
Great search functions and fact-checking resources. This site can quickly assist you in sorting the myths from the half-truths and the actual facts. The site consists of database search engines to check keywords from e-mails you have received, the latest headlines on hoaxes, special reports on 9-11 misinformation, and links to official and commercial sites on fraud, hoaxes and scams
The Red Tape Chronicles
Blogger Bob Sullivan looks at Internet scams and consumer fraud. Very easy to navigate and find what you’re looking for.
Purportal’s 9/11 Hoaxes
Bad quotes, media mistakes, scams and more.
StrangeFacts.com
A cool resource for offbeat stats and facts.
First Draft News
Guide to navigating eyewitness media, from discovery to verification.
Verification Junkie
This tool from Josh Stearns centralizes several social media verification tools in one place. Great for reporting and fact-checking on deadline.
The Ultimate Guide: How to Spot Phone Scams
DeadorAliveInfo.com
A handy quick-reference, fact-checking site for copy editors. Find out if a celebrity is dead or alive.
ConsumerWebWatch.org
It’s mission is to “investigate, inform and improve the credibility of information published on the World Wide Web.”
SmokingGun.com: Accidental Obits
A listing of mistaken obits on public figures.
Pantheon: Encyclopedia of Myths
Who’s Dead and Who’s Alive
A celebrity you may have thought was dead isn’t. See Abe Vigoda.
Vmyths
Separate truths from tall tales.
Argus Clearinghouse: Web Site Evaluations
This University of Michigan site rates Web sites on a scale of 1-5. Helps evaluate a site?s credibility. Note: The site is no longer actively maintained, but its archives are still useful.
HotBot: 10 Most Requested List
Ranks sites based on how often they?re visited.
SlipUps.com
Mistakes in movies, books, quotes, TV shows, etc.
Federal Trade Commission: Job Scams
MSN: 10 Biggest Internet Hoaxes of All Time
List from PC World.
MyDeathSpace.com
Web site that links to the MySpace pages of the dead.
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