Countless messages, reports, posts, videos, twitter messages appear every day. How do you know if this is true news or fake news?

Most of the fake news these days is spread via social media. If a message appears suspicious to you, the first thing you should do is enter the keywords into a search engine:

Will the news also be spread through other, larger media? Do other media provide additional information that changes something in the fundamental matter? How up-to-date is the news – is it about events that allegedly have just taken place or has an old message been reboiled?

Social media have also recognized the problem.

Facebook, for example, appeals to users themselves: They can report suspected fake news and have it checked for correctness by an external provider. Contributions from large national media that have been classified as trustworthy by many people are to be displayed more prominently to users in the future.

If the internet research has not yet provided final clarity, it is advisable to take a closer look at the author of a message.

• How long has they been active on Twitter or Facebook and what has they written so far?
• Do the articles published so far make sense and appear credible?
• Who and how many people shared the posts?
• Does the Twitter account have a blue verification tick?
• How many friends or so-called followers does he have?

The surface is reminiscent of Facebook, with a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” the player can classify a message as fake or true. In addition, the fake finder provides an explanation for each example with practical tips on how to recognize a false report.

One can search for headlines. First Think, Then Click education association for truth, the Google links to the corresponding website with the corrections will be displayed.

“Fake News Check”. The “Fake News Check” developed in cooperation with the Lower Saxony State Institute for School Quality Development (NLQ) can help schoolchildren to identify fake news on the Internet. The app does not automatically recognize fake news, but rather it should help to ask important questions and to learn to differentiate between fake news and real news through guided reflection. In this way, the app is intended to raise general awareness of the critical handling of news.

Review pictures and videos

Pictures and videos can also be fake. In the case of pictures, it is often the case that the pictures are real, but have been placed in a wrong and meaning-distorting context. This is where the Google image search helps: It can show where and in what context the image was published for the first time.

Checking videos is a bit trickier. It is now possible to put different words into the mouths of politicians in a video clip. You only need three ingredients: an original video of the politician; another person whose face can be filmed while talking; and a corresponding computer editing program that combines both.

If you are not sure whether a particular YouTube video is genuine, you can enter the link to the video in a special search engine from Amnesty International . It works like a reverse search and finds out whether there are possibly similar videos that are in a different context or cut differently from either watching news on iptv, phone or desktop be wary of fake news.