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Blockchain-Based Startups Empower Individuals to Identify Fake News

Back in 2017, a man named James McDaniel confessed that he had created a fake news website to test how gullible Internet readers could be. “As I continued to write ridiculous things they just kept getting shared and I kept drawing more viewers,” he told Politifact. In under two weeks, more than 1 million people had viewed and shared his inventions on social platforms, contributing to the vast spread of misinformation that characterized the 2016 US presidential election.

US citizens haven’t been the only ones affected by fake news. It’s been widely documented that misinformation also played a role in the UK Brexit vote and the 2018 Brazilian elections, which is why individuals, organizations, and governments around the world are starting to pay close attention to what’s true—and what’s not.

Cracking Down on Clickbait

Enter tech startups like Blackbird.AI, a San-Francisco-based company that seeks to ensure content is truthful and credible. Misinformation, the founders explain on their Medium page, “creates a cause and effect that will change everything from a political election to a social belief system.”

They seek to empower publishers, campaigns, businesses, governments, and citizens to catch fake news before it has a chance to take off. Their strategy: to introduce labels that evaluate content based on “credibility signals” such as who the author is, how the content was funded, and its ad quality score.

The labeling system is like a nutrition label for news, meaning that it allows readers to quickly and accurately evaluate how trustworthy a piece of online content is. By quickly helping people figure out what’s trustworthy and what’s not, it may cut down on the sharing and clicking on of false but shocking headlines.

To assign each piece of content a label, Blackbird.AI uses artificial intelligence to analyze millions of articles, track patterns, and classify news based on the credibility signals. Their technology scans articles, references, websites, social media pages, and memes—all in real-time. And, once the content is verified, it’s inscribed into the blockchain ledger for eternity.

Photo Evidence

Startups aren’t the only ones putting trust in the blockchain. Established publishers like the New York Times, for instance, are experimenting with blockchain as a way to validate their online content.

Their research and development team is planning to use Hyperledger Fabric’s permissioned blockchain to store important information about where the photo was taken, who the photographer was, and details about how it was edited.

Social Butterflies

Even social media sites are trying to do their part, as they should: 68% of Americans rely on them for their daily news. Google is debuting new fact-checking tools and promoting high-quality content, as well as donating a lot of money to global initiatives that help kids tell the difference between real and fake or misleading news. And Facebook, LinkedIn, and Twitter have all removed huge numbers of bogus accounts from their platforms.

But according to Civil, another blockchain-based news startup, still just 23% of people say trust news on social media, which means that it might be up to the blockchain disruptors to reform the system entirely.

There’s a rising wave of support for exactly that. Rather than scoff at their efforts, traditional, well-known publishers are giving a nod to what these startups are doing. “As the footprint of traditional newspapers is shrinking,” CBS News notes, “Civil’s is growing.”

The Columbia Journalism Review chimes in: “[Creating a new form of money] has the potential to help realign the incentives that underlie the journalism business.”

It’s true that the fight against misinformation has only just begun. Hackers and writers of fake news steadily evolve their tactics, and nothing beats good old critical thinking. As fake-news writer James McDaniel notes, visible disclaimers on his web pages explaining that his posts were “fiction, and presumably fake news” went largely unnoticed and unread by the millions who shared them.

Yet with startups like Blackbird.AI and Civil making it easier for Internet readers to identify and discount fake and misleading content, there’s hope for the future.

As Civil puts it: “You’ll have access to the news you need and can trust what you read.”

Image via SuperRGB on Unsplash

Terminating Fake News with Blockchain

Sometime in 2018, the American Herald Tribune website published a story about Friedrich (anglicized as ‘Frederick’) Trump, Donald Trump’s grandfather. The copy claimed that Frederick was a pimp and a regular drug user. The story went on to say that the man amassed a fortune running several brothels.

More recently, stories began to circulate about climate activist Greta Thunberg’s identity. Such stories claimed that Thunberg is not actually real, but a character played by a young actress named Estella Renee. These news stories, truculent and striking as they might be, are not true. They are fake news.

Fake news and deception in history

The use of misinformation is by no means a new occurrence. Deception tactics have been used in warfare for centuries. There is evidence that deception tactics were used during the Roman-Persian wars, for example, but Operation Fortitude is perhaps one of the best-known examples of a large-scale deception campaign in history. Fortitude was implemented as a prelude to the D-Day Landings, in the closing stages of WW2. The operation’s goal was to divert the German armies’ attention from the intended landing sites across Normandy by creating the illusion that Allied troops would land elsewhere.

In most recent times, deception and misinformation have morphed into the catch-all term ‘fake news’, which has become a widespread scourge in modern media.

In the kingdom of fake news, the half-truth is king

The American Herald Tribune story as a whole was false, and the author/s probably knew it, but some elements rang true in it, and the writers well probably well aware of this too. There are conflicting stories as to how Donald Trump’s grandfather Frederick acquired his wealth. While it is true that he opened a hospitality establishment (The Arctic Restaurant and Hotel) in Bennett, British Columbia, back in 1897, it is also widely believed that he used this hotel as a brothel, a practice that reportedly made him a very rich man. This wealth would trickle down the family tree, eventually landing at Donald Trump’s lap.

It is this half-truth facet that makes fake news believable. But fake news needs one key element to warrant their existence, one that those bent on spreading misinformation cannot do without–an audience.

We live in an era where social media reigns supreme. People spend a great deal of their time online: Shopping, reading, gaming, learning, and a myriad of other activities can be experienced through reflective screens. It is this perma-presence in the online world that makes it so ready-made for the propagation of fake news.

About 2 billion people have Facebook accounts. That’s around one-third of the world population. Such huge uptake creates a fertile ground for the rapid spread of misinformation or fake news, and the bad news is that, so far, there hasn’t been any effective means to combat this scourge.

How can blockchain help to kill fake news

Facebook, Instagram, and a myriad of other apps and media providers bombard us with text and video content every minute of every day, and in the virtual world, telling what’s real and what’s not is a rather difficult task, particularly if there is a concerted and well-organized campaign behind the effort.

Blockchain has emerged as an effective weapon to counteract the insidious effects of fake news. The technology is characterized by its inherent decentralization and transparency, which effectively means that there is no central authority regulating it, and the network state is visible to every participating node.

Blockchain’s traits enable a tamper-proof mechanism whereby any data stored on the chain becomes immutable. This can be applied to anything: Shipping information, medical records, and of course, news items.

Take any photograph, video, or news content found online. How can you really tell whether it’s real or fake? Blockchain can add immutable metadata to any content, thus creating a digital history that will follow that particular piece of content anywhere it goes. This digital history can be traced and verified anytime, anywhere, so there is no possibility of changes along the way.

Conclusion

There is evidence suggesting that the American Herald Tribune originates in Iran, which may explain the Friedrich Trump story, among others. Fake news is often the first salvo in a multi-layered misinformation campaign to fulfill an agenda, whether it stems from an individual or a government. Because of the inherent dangers of fake news, many agencies are fighting to terminate the threat.

Commercial entities like Orange, of France’s largest telecommunications companies, and the New York Times, are developing blockchain-powered projects to fight, and hopefully, eliminate or greatly reduce the prevalence of misinformation, deepfakes, and fake news in the media. How successful these efforts will remain to be seen, but it is at least a step in the right direction.

Image source: Roman Kraft via Unsplash

Verizon's New Blockchain Verification Tool 'Full Transparency' Combats Fake News

Verizon Communications Inc, a telecommunications service producer has unveiled a blockchain-based solution dubbed ‘Full Transparency’ for the verification of news and media releases.

According to Verizon’s announcement, the Full Transparency solution is an open-source newsroom product that will enable any media information to be tracked on the blockchain, giving the public a level of trust in the information being shared.

As the world embraces a greater shift to digital media as boosted by the coronavirus pandemic, the need to verify information has become more vital and a system created for information sharers particularly corporate entities to be held accountable. This is what Verizon’s Full Transparency is set to usher in.

“As a technology company that quite literally connects people to information, we are excited to bring Full Transparency to market—a product that, in its own quiet way, can help ensure corporate accountability and trust,” said Jim Gerace, Chief Communications Officer for Verizon. “We invite organizations across the world that prize transparency as much as we do to adopt blockchain-verified communication practices.”

Blockchain to The Rescue In Fighting Fake News

With the expansion of the use cases of blockchain technology, there has been significant advocacy for the use of the technology to combat fake news. Just as in the case of Verizon’s Full Transparency open-source blockchain platform, information providers will be more cautious before publishing the news or information they have as any changes or alterations will not be possible on the blockchain and if possible, it would be visible to all.

The fight to combat fake news with blockchain technology dates back to before the COVID-19 pandemic broke out as such startups including Blackbird.AI and Civil are making it easier for Internet readers to identify and discount fake and misleading news by introducing labels that evaluate content based on “credibility signals” such as who the author is, how the content was funded, and its ad quality score.

Looking into Fake Press Release on Bitcoin Cash Partnership: Ohio’s Kroger

The Kroger Company, a major US retail firm headquartered in Ohio, is investigating fake news was published on PR Newswire, a service used by major businesses to distribute press releases.

On Friday, November 5, PR Newswire published a press release, claiming that Kroger will accept Bitcoin Cash cryptocurrency at its retail stores this holiday season.

However, the grocery retailer responded to the incident and indicated that the press release was fake news.

In an email statement, a Kroger spokesperson stated that “this communication was fraudulent and is unfounded and should be disregarded,” and added that Kroger was in touch with PRN on the issue.

Kroger becomes the second major retailer in recent weeks to get entangled in a cryptocurrency scam.

PR Newswire removed the inaccurate press release from its website afterwards, but not before the false information was picked up by some publications including Kroger’s own investor relations site.

PR Newswire stated that it was “urgently investigating the incident including looking into any criminal activity associated with this matter.”

Kroger also deleted the release, which appeared on its investor relations page, automatically received from PR Newswire as a direct feed.

This seems to be the latest attempt to boost a cryptocurrency by linking it to a major retailer.

The price of Bitcoin Cash surged briefly on Friday, hitting $636 before going back to $600 according to CoinMarketCap.

Crypto Fraud

The incident follows a similar situation that occurred in September, when GlobeNewswire published a false press release, stating that Walmart would begin accepting Litecoin cryptocurrency.

Walmart later confirmed that the information was false but not before the fake release received some attention and temporarily spiked the value of Litecoin.

As reported by Blockchain.News on September 13, Walmart Inc issued a press release in response to the fake news of its partnership with Litecoin. The giant retail firm stated that the announcement issued by Globenewswire was false and have had no relationship with Litecoin.

Following the incident, Walmart had been in touch with the new newswire firm to investigate how the false news got posted.