LibGuides: Fake News and Alternative Facts: Finding Accurate News: Move 4: Trace Claims Back to the Original Source

Move 4: Trace Claims Back to the Original Source

Oftentimes, the more a story is shared, the more it can acquire misleading context in the form of captions and editing of the visual, audio, or video components.

This is why it's important to trace a piece of information back to its original context!

A lot of things you find on the internet have been stripped of context. Maybe there's a video of a fight between two people. But what happened before that? Who started it? What was clipped out of the video and what stayed in? Maybe there's a picture that seems real but the caption is dubious at best. Maybe a claim is made about a new medical treatment supposedly based on a research paper — but you're not certain if the paper supports it.

In these cases we'll have you trace the claim, quote, or media back to the source, so you can see it in its original context and get a sense if the version you saw was accurately presented.

Search Strategy: Finding the History of Images

Because most of the information we find online is largely visual in nature, tracking the history of an image can be important in determining how accurate that information is. Watch the video (4:14) above to learn about how to find original images.

Try it!

First, isolate the claim in question. Try to rephrase it in different terms, in order to be clear about what you are tracing back to its original source. For example, if a source says "Owning a cat makes you live up to 25% longer!", think about the key terms (pet ownership, felines, longer life expectancy).
Try to determine what kind of information the claim is based on. Is it a scientific finding? A statistic? A quote or testimony from a specific person? False claims are usually given some kind of impressive or at least legitimate-sounding attribution.
Try searching Google to see if legitimate sites are confirming the claim in question. Use a fact-checking site to see if the claim has been identified as true, false, or somewhere in between.
If a "study" or "paper" is referenced, instead of clicking the link provided, hover first and see if the URL tells you where it leads. Then open up a new tab and see if you can independently find the press release announcing the findings. Example: a source you are evaluating says "A recent Harvard study shows that toxic work culture can literally give you a heart attack!" You might use Google to search for "harvard study heart attack work" and scan the results using some click restraint to find this result: Increasing workplace flexibility associated with lower risk of cardiovascular disease.

Attribution

Note: This SIFT method guide was adapted from Michael Caulfield's "Check, Please!" course. The canonical version of this course exists at http://lessons.checkplease.cc. The text and media of this site, where possible, is released into the CC-BY, and free for reuse and revision. We ask people copying this course to leave this note intact, so that students and teachers can find their way back to the original (periodically updated) version if necessary. We also ask librarians and reporters to consider linking to the canonical version.

As the authors of the original version have not reviewed any other copy's modifications, the text of any site not arrived at through the above link should not be sourced to the original authors.