NewsGuard is a journalism and technology tool that rates the credibility of news and information websites and tracks online

misinformation Misinformation is incorrect or misleading information. It differs from disinformation, which is ''deliberately'' deceptive. Rumors are information not attributed to any particular source, and so are unreliable and often unverified, but can turn ...

. It operates a browser extension and

mobile apps A mobile application or app is a computer program or software application designed to run on a mobile device such as a phone, tablet, or watch. Mobile applications often stand in contrast to desktop applications which are designed to run on des ...

for consumers as well as services for businesses, including a brand safety tool for advertisers and services for search engines, social media apps, cybersecurity firms, and government agencies. NewsGuard's trust ratings for news websites are based on nine criteria related to a source's journalistic practices. Based on the nine criteria, each site is assigned a trust score of 0-100 and an overall rating of red (generally untrustworthy) or green (generally trustworthy). The rating is accompanied by a "Nutrition Label" that explains why the site received its rating on each of the nine criteria. NewsGuard says it has rated more than 6,000 news sources that account for 95% of engagement with news in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the European mainland, continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotlan ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

, and

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

. NewsGuard operates a consumer-facing browser extension and

for

iOS iOS (formerly iPhone OS) is a mobile operating system created and developed by Apple Inc. exclusively for its hardware. It is the operating system that powers many of the company's mobile devices, including the iPhone; the term also include ...

and Android that label news sources with a red or green icon indicating the site's rating and enable users to read each site's "Nutrition Label" from NewsGuard. Supported browsers for the browser extension include Google Chrome,

Microsoft Edge Microsoft Edge is a proprietary, cross-platform web browser created by Microsoft. It was first released in 2015 as part of Windows 10 and Xbox One and later ported to other platforms as a fork of Google's Chromium open-source project: Android ...

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements current ...

, and Safari. It is included by default in the mobile version of Edge, though users must enable it.

Background

NewsGuard Technologies was founded in 2018 by Steven Brill and L. Gordon Crovitz, who serve as co-CEOs. Its current team include journalists such as the former publisher of ''

The Wall Street Journal ''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...

'', the founder of ''

The American Lawyer ''The American Lawyer'' is a monthly legal magazine and website published by ALM Media. The periodical and its parent company, ALM (then American Lawyer Media), were founded in 1979 by Steven Brill.CourtTV, as well as former editors at

Reuters Reuters ( ) is a news agency owned by Thomson Reuters Corporation. It employs around 2,500 journalists and 600 photojournalists in about 200 locations worldwide. Reuters is one of the largest news agencies in the world. The agency was esta ...

, the

Associated Press The Associated Press (AP) is an American non-profit news agency headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1846, it operates as a cooperative, unincorporated association. It produces news reports that are distributed to its members, U.S. ne ...

, and the ''

Chicago Tribune The ''Chicago Tribune'' is a daily newspaper based in Chicago, Illinois, United States, owned by Tribune Publishing. Founded in 1847, and formerly self-styled as the "World's Greatest Newspaper" (a slogan for which WGN radio and television a ...

''. Investors include the Knight Foundation and

Publicis Publicis Groupe is a French multinational advertising and public relations company. One of the oldest and largest marketing and communications companies in the world by revenue, it is headquartered in Paris. After 1945, the little-known Paris ...

. The NewsGuard extension is installed in browsers and warns users when they view content from what it considers

fake news website Fake news websites (also referred to as hoax news websites) are websites on the Internet that deliberately publish fake news— hoaxes, propaganda, and disinformation purporting to be real news—often using social media to drive web traffic and ...

s. Journalists employed by NewsGuard Technologies score news sites on their reliability and general trustworthiness. The analysis is designed to be transparent and includes the name of the staffer who analyzed the site. Sites that score at least 60 out of 100 points based on nine criteria display a green icon next to their name, and ones that score lower get a red. Users can optionally read more information, including how the sites fared in each criterion. The extension can also highlight potential conflicts of interest, such as websites that do not disclose that they are financed by lobbying groups. NewsGuard determines a website's overall credibility score based on a number of criteria. These include: * The frequency of publication of inaccurate information * The extent of sourcing and original reporting of information * The degree of demarcation between news and opinion journalism * The accuracy of headlines, including the use of

clickbait Clickbait is a text or a thumbnail link that is designed to attract attention and to entice users to follow that link and read, view, or listen to the linked piece of online content, being typically deceptive, sensationalized, or otherwise mis ...

headlines * The degree of disclosure of the website's ownership, as well as the political positions of the owners Brill positions the extension as an alternative to government regulation and automated algorithms, such as those used by

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...

. For revenue, NewsGuard Technologies licenses their ratings. Clients include technology companies and the advertising industry, who view the ratings as a way to protect clients against advertising on sites that could harm their brand. In January 2019, the extension was integrated into the mobile version of

, though users must enable it. Sites that had previously ignored the extension, such as

MailOnline MailOnline (also known as ''dailymail.co.uk'') is the website of the '' Daily Mail'', a newspaper in the United Kingdom, and of its sister paper '' The Mail on Sunday''. MailOnline is a division of dmg media, which is owned by Daily Mail and ...

, objected to being listed as unreliable. The decision to list MailOnline as unreliable was reversed, and NewsGuard admitted they were wrong on some counts. Sites labeled as unreliable include

InfoWars ''InfoWars'' is an American far-right conspiracy theory and fake news website owned by Alex Jones. It was founded in 1999, and operates under Free Speech Systems LLC. Talk shows and other content for the site are created primarily in stud ...

, the ''

Daily Kos Daily Kos ( ) is a group blog and internet forum focused on the U.S. Democratic Party and liberal American politics. The site includes glossaries and other content. It is sometimes considered an example of " netroots" activism. Daily Kos was ...

'', Sputnik, RT,

WikiLeaks WikiLeaks () is an international non-profit organisation that published news leaks and classified media provided by anonymous sources. Julian Assange, an Australian Internet activist, is generally described as its founder and director and ...

, and

Fox News The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...

. NewsGuard has been criticized by ''

Breitbart News ''Breitbart News Network'' (known commonly as ''Breitbart News'', ''Breitbart'', or ''Breitbart.com'') is an Radical right (United States), American far-rightMultiple sources: * * * * * * * * * * * * syndicated news, opinion, and commentary ...

'' as "the establishment media's latest effort to blacklist alternative media sites". NewsGuard attempts to work with sites they label as unreliable to advise them on how to come into compliance with their criteria. NewsGuard expanded its coverage to news in European languages such as French and German ahead of the

2019 European Parliament election The 2019 European Parliament election was held between 23 and 26 May 2019, the ninth parliamentary election since the first direct elections in 1979. A total of 751 Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) represent more than 512 million peop ...

. In April 2019, the co-founders of NewsGuard announced that they had entered talks with British internet service providers to incorporate their credibility scoring system into consumer internet packages. Under the plans, a user would see a warning message before visiting a misleading site without needing to have the NewsGuard extension installed. Users would also have the ability to disable the feature. In January 2020, NewsGuard began notifying users that it would become a paid, member-supported browser extension in early 2020, while remaining free for libraries and schools. Early adopters would get a 33% discount on the price, paying $1.95/month (USD) or £1.95/month (UK). They plan to roll out new premium features, including a reliability score, and offer new mobile apps for Android and

. They reported ratings of "3,800 websites that account for 95% of engagement with news in the U.S., U.K., France, Germany and Italy." As of January 2021, NewsGuard says it has rated for more than 6,000 news sites that account for 95% of online engagement with news in the U.S., the U.K., France, Germany and Italy.

Criticism

The adoption of this tool by educational organizations and institutions has been criticized on the ground that the NewsGuard Advisory Board includes people from agencies known for producing false news and opponents of organized educators, as well as studies that show that critical news literacy is more effective than a label approach and concerns over pupil exploitation through data mining.

References

External links

* {{Official website, https://www.newsguardtech.com/ Google Chrome extensions Microsoft Edge extensions Nonfree Firefox WebExtensions Fake news Internet properties established in 2018

Background

Criticism

See also

References

External links