Fact-Checking and Rumor Verification Tools

  • Africa Check
    • A non-profit organization established in 2012 to promote accuracy in the public debate and media in Africa. Africa Check was devised by the non-profit media development arm of the international news agency AFP.
  • Agência Pública – Truco
    • Partnered with independent centers of journalism in Latin America, the United States and Europe, traditional news outlets and exponents of new media, Agência Pública’s reports are based on rigorous investigation of the facts with the uncompromising defense of human rights as a principle. Their driving investigative threads are: the impact of mega sporting events; torture and violence by state agents; mega investments in the Amazon; urban crisis; and human rights violations in business.
  • Emergent
    • Affiliated w/ Columbia University. “Emergent is a real-time rumor tracker. It’s part of a research project with the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University that focuses on how unverified information and rumor are reported in the media. It aims to develop best practices for debunking misinformation.” 
  • FactCheck.org
    • Affiliated w/ University of Pennsylvania. “We are a nonpartisan, nonprofit “consumer advocate” for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. We monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews and news releases. Our goal is to apply the best practices of both journalism and scholarship, and to increase public knowledge and understanding.”
  • Hoaxy
    • Affiliated w/ Indiana University. “Hoaxy visualizes the spread of claims and related fact checking online. A claim may be a fake news article, hoax, rumor, conspiracy theory, satire, or even an accurate report. Anyone can use Hoaxy to explore how claims spread across social media. You can select any matching fact-checking articles to observe how those spread as well.”
  • Pheme
    • A claim verification project with the goal of developing technology for finding out how true claims are. Receives funding from the EU. “With partners from seven different countries, the project will combine big data analytics with advanced linguistic and visual methods. The results will be suitable for direct application in medical information systems and digital journalism.”
  • PolitiFact
    • “PolitiFact is a fact-checking website that rates the accuracy of claims by elected officials and others who speak up in American politics. PolitiFact is run by editors and reporters from the Tampa Bay Times, an independent newspaper in Florida, as is PunditFact, a site devoted to fact-checking pundits. The PolitiFact state sites are run by news organizations that have partnered with the Times. The state sites and PunditFact follow the same principles as the national site.”
  • Snopes
    • “The snopes.com website was founded by David Mikkelson, who lives and works in the Los Angeles area. What he began in 1995 as an expression of his interest in researching urban legends has since grown into what is widely regarded by folklorists, journalists, and laypersons alike as one of the World Wide Web’s essential resources. Snopes.com is routinely included in annual “Best of the Web” lists and has been the recipient of two Webby awards.”
  • Truth or Fiction
    • Non-partisan fact-checking website that includes visual examples of how the rumor/fake news story was presented, e.g. Tweet, meme, etc.
  • Washington Post Fact Checker
    • “The purpose of this Web site, and an accompanying column in the Sunday print edition of The Washington Post, is to “truth squad” the statements of political figures regarding issues of great importance, be they national, international or local.”Impact
Tools