The Need for Journalism to Respond to the Issue of ‘Fake News’

The final speaker at this ECREA 2018 session is my QUT colleague Aljosha Karim Schapals, who shifts our focus to the vexing question of ‘fake news’. However we define such content, it appears to have had a considerable effect on recent events, and some of the most shared stories on Facebook in recent years have been revealed as mis- or disinformation.

There are also a number of dedicated Websites that have been set up to peddle ‘fake news’, and these are often immensely active at generating and disseminating new content. Such sites are also relevant to our study of Journalism beyond the Crisis, of course, as the rise of ‘fake news’ both perpetuates the crisis and points to some possible solutions.

Most centrally, then, how should journalists deal with ‘fake news’ online? Overall, journalism may act as a watchdog for society; it needs to respond to the speed with which ‘fake news’ disseminate online; and it must respond to the decrease of public trust in the media that results from the moral panic about ‘fake news’. But the watchdog role is diminished if society can no longer agree on basic facts, and if a segment of the population no longer believe the facts that journalism provides; the speed of journalism in an always-on, social media environment may lead to the accidental transmission of ‘fake news’ without sufficient verification, and journalists need to develop a better understanding of just how ‘fake news’ spreads; and journalism must therefore also find ways to rebuild public trust in the news, for instance through fact-checking initiatives.

Journalists are increasingly realising these needs, and many readers are also coming to develop a better understanding of this issue; this is also evident in the success of some news outlets in attracting paying subscribers who are making a concerted effort to seek trustworthy and reliable information to their publications. Audiences are also being helped by an increasing amount of initiatives to help differentiate truth and falsehood, and by digital literacy initiatives.