LibGuides: News Media and Fact-Checking: Fact-Checking, Bias, and Misleading Information

FactCheck.org
A nonpartisan, nonprofit “consumer advocate” for voters that aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics. They monitor the factual accuracy of what is said by major U.S. political players in the form of TV ads, debates, speeches, interviews and news releases.
Poltifact
Fact-checking nonprofit known for its "Truth-O-Meter" ratings which assesses the accuracy of statements made by public figures.
Reuters Fact Check
The world’s largest multimedia news provider. This resource examines social media narratives and misinformation.
Rumor Guard
A project of the News Literacy Project (NLP), a nonpartisan education nonprofit. NLP created RumorGuard to help us all learn how to recognize misinformation and stop it in its tracks. Each fact-checked viral rumor contains concrete tips to help you build your news literacy foundation and confidently evaluate claims you see online.
Snopes
Snopes got its start in 1994, investigating urban legends, hoaxes, and folklore. As demand for reliable fact checks grew, so did Snopes. Now it’s the oldest and largest fact-checking site online, widely regarded by journalists, folklorists, and readers as an invaluable research companion.

Media Bias Chart This link opens in a new window
An interactive Media Bias Chart to help navigate and understand news source biases. Analysts come from a wide political spectrum and follow a careful, robust methodology to rate the news. You do not need to create an account to use Berklee's account. If you are getting an error message try allowing third party cookies or refreshing your browser.

YourLogicalFallacyIs.com (The School of Thought)
Engaging and easy-to-use resource to understand rhetorical devices used to manipulate facts. As defined by the publisher, fallacies are "a flaw in thinking where something doesn’t make sense or ‘doesn’t follow’ logically. People will often commit logical fallacies as a way to trick others into believing that they have a good argument"
YourBias.Is (The School of Thought)
"Cognitive biases make our judgments irrational. We have evolved to use shortcuts in our thinking, which are often useful, but a cognitive bias means there’s a kind of misfiring going on causing us to lose objectivity. This website has been designed to help you identify some of the most common biases stuffing up your thinking."
"Filter Bubbles" TED Talk (Eli Pariser)
How social media algorithms distort what we see.
3 Ways to Spot a Bad Statistic TED Talk (Mona Chalabi)
Sometimes it's hard to know what statistics are worthy of trust. But we shouldn't count out stats altogether ... instead, we should learn to look behind them. In this delightful, hilarious talk, data journalist Mona Chalabi shares handy tips to help question, interpret and truly understand what the numbers are saying.

Media Bias Chart This link opens in a new window
An interactive Media Bias Chart to help navigate and understand news source biases. Analysts come from a wide political spectrum and follow a careful, robust methodology to rate the news. You do not need to create an account to use Berklee's account. If you are getting an error message try allowing third party cookies or refreshing your browser.

Click to view the static version of this Media Bias Chart. Visit here for an interactive version.

	Funny	Fake
Definition	[Funny] Satire: "a way of criticizing people or ideas in a humorous way, especially in order to make a political point, or a piece of writing that uses this style" - Cambridge English Dictionary	Fake News: "false stories that appear to be news, spread on the internet or using other media, usually created to influence political views or as a joke" - Cambridge English Dictionary
Purpose	political commentary, social criticism, exposing irony	Deceive, confuse, and manipulate
Related Terms	satire, parody, humor	hoax, propaganda, disinformation, fraud, trolling
Website Design and other Indicators	- looks like real news - includes an "About" page that indicates the satirical purpose of the publication - The URL and/or web domain will be distinctive to that publication and you can easily find out who is responsible for the content, along with contact information (e.g. conduct a "WHOIS" search to find out who owns the domain) - It will be clear who is responsible for the content, either through an author byline, an "About" page, contact information, or known personalities affiliated with the content.	- looks like real news - may include an "About page" that will be written in a way to present itself as legitimate - The URL and/or web domain will be generic or deceptive (e.g. it is made to look like a well-known news source's URL but will be slightly different) - It will appear as though a credentialed person or entity is behind the content. However, upon deeper investigation, it will be less obvious who is truly responsible for the content. Research may reveal that the "authors" are not real and/or that this content is created by a foreign entity or an algorithm with the intent to be deceptive.
Examples	- Satirical television news programs - Satirical news websites - Satirical magazines	- Fake news websites

News Databases & Websites

Library Databases

Access with your OnePass, these include full-text articles, including the most recent articles from these publications' print editions.

Boston Globe This link opens in a new window Major daily newspaper covering Boston, New England and the world. Detailed indexing helps users quickly find the news information they need. Each issue is indexed thoroughly, so they have access to not only top news stories but also the information contained on the various sections of the paper. The indexing covers not only complete bibliographic information but also companies, people, products, etc. Full-text coverage from 1980.
Flipster This link opens in a new window Flipster is our digital magazine service for accessing magazines online. Our titles include Billboard, Rolling Stone, Jazztimes, Downbeat, New Yorker, Future Music, Backstage, The Atlantic, and more.
Global Issues In Context This link opens in a new window Offers international viewpoints on a broad spectrum of global issues, topics, and current events. Featured are hundreds of continuously updated issue and country portals that bring together a variety of specially selected, highly relevant sources for analysis of social, political, military, economic, environmental, health, and cultural issues.
News, Gale OneFile This link opens in a new window Full-text newspaper resource allows users to search articles instantly by title, headline, date, author, newspaper section, or other fields. Gale OneFile: News provides access to more than 2,300 major U.S. regional, national, and local newspapers, as well as leading titles from around the world. It also includes thousands of images, radio and TV broadcasts and transcripts.

A spreadsheet of the complete list of the 3,500+ publications available in this database, including descriptions and countries of publication (as of December 2023)

New York Times This link opens in a new window Search for articles in the New York Times. Coverage from 1995-present.

News Websites

Associated Press
The Associated Press is an independent global news organization dedicated to factual reporting.
International Consortium of Investigative Journalists
Investigative journalism driven by the belief that citizens have the right to be better informed, that access to independently-sourced facts is not only essential for democracy but is also a fundamental human right.
ProPublica
Independent, nonprofit newsroom that produces investigative journalism that digs deep into important issues, shining a light on abuses of power and betrayals of public trust.

News Media and Fact-Checking: Fact-Checking, Bias, and Misleading Information

News Databases & Websites

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