Rapidly expanding fact-checking movement faces growing pains

Washington Post:

(shameless plug: this occurred at my High School in Rome)



ROME — Political fact-checkers from more than 50 countries gathered here to take stock of a fast-growing journalistic movement that has gained clout and influence while attracting criticism and heightened skepticism in an increasingly partisan age.

Facebook has enlisted 24 fact-checking organizations in 14 countries to help weed out fake news on the social network, while policymakers and parliamentarians in Brazil, Italy and Spain, and at the European Union, have sought advice from fact-checkers on the challenge of misinformation. Google now highlights fact checks in its search results and Bing has developed a special fact-checking page that features recent fact checks.

But fact-checkers have increasingly come under attack, facing accusations of bias and partisanship that the neutral journalistic format was supposed to avoid.

“A dark cloud hangs over us,” said Alexios Mantzarlis, director of the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN), the umbrella organization that organized the meeting, when he opened the three-day conference on June 20. “The disaffection and distrust that have plagued mainstream media outlets for many years is now spilling over to fact-checkers. In Turkey, the Philippines and especially Brazil it broke out in the form of concerted campaigns aimed to vilify fact-checking as an instrument.”