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Microsoft Fights Fake News With NewsGuard Integration in Its Mobile Edge Browser (pcworld.com)
In a bid to fight fake news read while on your phone, Microsoft's mobile Edge browser on Android and iOS now includes the NewsGuard extension. From a report: The addition needs to be toggled on within the Edge settings menu to be enabled. Once it is, Edge will display a small shield icon next to the site's URL in the search bar: a green shield with a checkmark for a trusted news site, and a red shield with an exclamation point inside of it for a site that NewsGuard believes isn't always accurate. (Some sites haven't been evaluated, and these will simply show a gray shield.)
The UK Daily Mail, a well-known source of ill-informed and reactionary garbage.
Slashdot: prepare to be BANNED.
We should simplify this and instead provide a liberal or conservative flag. Unfortunately many people value political implications over the truth. It's the sad reality of living in a post-fact world.
Because we are trained journalists who have spent our careers dedicated to the profession. We care deeply about reliable journalismâ(TM)s pivotal role in democracy. (In case youâ(TM)re wondering, our experienced journalists come from diverse backgrounds and have no political axes to grind.)
Because you can see the credentials and backgrounds of everyone responsible for every NewsGuard reliability rating and Nutrition Label that you read. For the names and biographies of our staff and contributors, click here.
Because we have an ethics and conflicts of interest policy to which all of our analysts and editors have to agree. You can read that policy here.
Because we are totally transparent about how we make all of our decisions. Our Nutrition Label write-ups explain what is behind our decisions. We disclose and explain in detail the nine criteria we use to rate each news site on its journalistic practices. Weâ(TM)re not a black box algorithm.
Because we make concerted attempts to get comment from every websiteâ(TM)s editor or manager before we write anything negative about the site, and always include the comment in our Nutrition Labels (or make changes after weighing the comment and realizing our initial conclusion was wrong). Algorithms donâ(TM)t call for comment.
Because we will post any complaints from website proprietors about anything we have written about them. And we will answer them publicly â" and when warranted will make corrections, publicly, after we consider the complaint. You can read our policy for correcting errors or mistakes here.
Because we accept no fees from the news websites we rate. (Our revenue comes from the platforms and search engines for licensing our ratings in order to include them in their feeds and search results.) We rate all news and information sites among the approximately 4,500 sites responsible for 98% of the online engagement in English in the United States.
Because we do not collect any personal information of any kind from those who download and use our browser plug-ins. None. You can read our privacy policy here.
Because bringing more information to people about the news sources they encounter online is our only business. Our success depends entirely on being trustworthy and reliable.
The problem with this NewsGuard extension is that the more likely someone is to need it, the less likely they are to want it (and the more likely they are to actively dislike the idea of it).
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Because it's backed by the neocons. You remember them, right? The folks whose handling of intelligence over Iraq made Obama's handling of the DIA report on ISIS look like a highly cordial disagreement between respectful parties? If they say that Hitler is a bad guy, you better get independent sources.
Who determines what is "fake news"?
This should scare people. Don't they realize we are ASKING businesses/governments to make judgement calls of what is fake news? Translation: People are asking these entities to censor what they feel is fake news.
This seems like a dangerous idea to me. Heavens know a business will not call something it doesn't like to be fake news. Nor would a government who doesn't agree with certain ideas would call something fake news.
- The fact-checks behind 'The Daily Show's' 50 Fox news 'lies'
By Lauren Carroll, Aaron Sharockman on Thursday, February 26th, 2015 at 3:00 p.m.
The Daily Show posted a Vine Wednesday titled, "50 Fox News lies in 6 seconds."
We’ve fact-checked almost all of the statements they cited. For the record, we originally counted 49 claims, not 50. The Daily Show said No. 50 was left off due to a technical error. They've updated their Vine, which we've included here.
* * *
1. "In July 2010 the government said small businesses -- 60 percent -- will lose their health care, 45 percent of big business and a large percentage of individual health." Sean Hannity, Nov. 11, 2013 False
* * *
2. "And President Obama has offered to pay out of his own pocket for the museum of Muslim culture out of his own pocket, yet it's the Republican National Committee who's paying for this." Anna Kooiman, Oct. 5, 2013 https://bit.ly/2W1wHzv
* * *
3. Labor union president Andy Stern is "the most frequent visitor" at the White House. Glenn Beck, Dec. 3, 2009 False
* * *
4. "Far more children died last year drowning in their bathtubs than were killed accidentally by guns." Tucker Carlson, Aug. 9, 2014 Pants on Fire
* * *
5. White House Political Director Patrick Gaspard once served as the "right-hand man" for Bertha Lewis, who heads up ACORN. Steve Doocy, Sept. 29, 2009 False
* * *
6. "Look at the debt that has been accumulated in the last two years. It's more debt under this president than all those other presidents combined."
Sarah Palin, May 31, 2011 False
* * *
7. "There is no good data showing secondhand smoke kills people." John Stossel, Dec. 4, 2014 False
* * *
8. "Democrats are poised now to cause this largest tax increase in U.S. history." Sarah Palin, Aug. 1, 2010 Pants on Fire
* * *
9. "The insurance industry is actually run by mostly Democrats." Dana Perino, Oct. 31, 2013 False
* * *
10. The Obama administration "manipulated deportation data to make it appear that the Border Patrol was deporting more illegal immigrants than the Bush administration." Lou Dobbs, July 1, 2014 False
* * *
11. Some doctors say Ebola can be transmitted through the air by "a sneeze or some cough." George Will, Oct. 19, 2014 False
* * *
12. Says the Texas State Board of Education is considering eliminating references to Christmas and the Constitution in textbooks. Gretchen Carlson, March 10, 2010 Pants on Fire
* * *
13. Because of President Barack Obama’s failure to "push job creation," the black unemployment rate in Ferguson, Mo., is three times higher than the white unemployment rate. Lou Dobbs, Aug. 19, 2014 False
* * *
14. When White House communications director Anita Dunn said that Mao Tse-tung was "one of her favorite philosophers, only Fox News picked that up."
Bill O’Reilly, Oct. 23, 2009 False
* * *
15. "The president of the United States will be taking a trip over to India that is expected to cost the taxpayers $200 million a day." Michele Bachmann, Nov. 3, 2010 False (Note: Bachmann’s claim was made on CNN, not Fox News but Glenn Beck made a similar claim on Fox)
* * *
16. "We researched to find out if anybody on Fox News had ever said you're going to jail if you don't buy health insurance. Nobody's ever said it." Bill O’Reilly, Oct. 27, 2010 Pants on Fire
* * *
17. "If you make more than $250,000 a year you only really take home about $125,000." Steve Doocy, July 11, 2012 False
* * *
18. A Census Bureau worker says he was told to skew information to bring the unemployment rate down "as we headed into an election season." Elisabeth Hasselbeck, Nov. 19, 2013 False
* * *
19. "Health care mandate will require imprisonment and fines for Americans who can’t afford to purchase insurance or pay hefty government penalties." Patients First, Sept. 21, 2009 Mostly False (Note: Fox hosts have said closely similar statements because of our research into Bill O’Reilly’s Pants on Fire claim -- No.
BuzzFeedNews rated as trustworthy. Nope.
I guess Microsoft is competing with Google in the Wokelympics.
I'm a grownup human being. I don't need a company (that has its own bias and agenda) telling me which news sources to trust and which to distrust.
I knew right away Microsoft's opinion was worthless when I followed the link in the summary and saw Breitbart flagged. Yes, Breitbart has a right-leaning bias, but it's like an antidote to the main stream media's false and biased reporting.
You all probably don't see it because of your hatred for everything Trump, but in my nearly 66 years I've never seen so much hatred for a president from the press, a press that's SUPPOSED to be unbiased.
Just a few years ago Trump was getting awards from the NAACP, but now he's racist? Don't be so stupid to believe shit like that. Show some independence and intelligence, for Pete's sake. I see you and I see sheep.
to both talk shit about right-leaning news outlets and by their presence to make us believe we need some white knight (like NewsGuard!) to ride to the rescue.
What a nice feature . . if this was employed on any other browser besides Edge Mobile or even if this was an on feature.
The people who would have this app installed and be included to enable this in settings represent the smallest market share also are probably the demographic least affected by Fake News.
people-older-than-65-share-the-most-fake-news-study-finds
For some hilarity, I would love to see the telemetry data on this. 0.00000000001% of market share.
Thanks for trying Microsoft, but this isn't the feature that is going to win us over. You have lost the mobile browser.
Any word on pricing? I'd very much like to become a "trusted news source."
A government is a body of people notably ungoverned - AC
This comes down to:
If you want to believe it, no amount of other people telling you its fake is going to change things.
I wish all people would approach all new with skepticism and do a bit of homework before believing mydumbnews.com, but that isn't going to happen.
Maybe we should stop giving credibility to bloggers, journalism hacks, and stories that lack any factual presentations. Some people seem OK with tabloid style journalism just because it supports their belief system. Doesn't matter if a hint of it is true, factual or has any real credible sources. So the solution is fake news filters? Maybe demand better journalism would be a better option.
Both of them.
They refuse to accept money from the sites they rate. Which makes sense, because it hardly seems the couple of million dollars would be worth the loss of trust that would cause.
Your ad here. Ask me how!
Anything it claims is untrue, should probably be paid extra attention to so that you can get a sense of what the mainstream media is trying to hide.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Because we have all had proper indoctrination into leftist politics, you can be sure all our approved sources unflinchingly follow right think. Our team of specialists is prepared to readily ignore all the mistakes friendly news sources make, as long as their bias agrees with us. We are also promise to categorize any mistake that slants to the wrong side as profound evidence for systematic banishment as fake news.
You should let the idiots talk and prove themselves idiots. More effective.
Now, if the government and people are afraid too many will be fooled...then all that money they take from us by force to indoctrinate our kids must be getting wasted doing that instead of teaching critical thinking and other useful skills - we make them so stupid they take out huge non recourse loans and overpay to get degrees in things that there are no jobs doing, in an economy that now requires every adult in a household to have a job just to get by, unlike when I grew up - proof right there.
And maybe that idea is one of the "fake news" issues they'd just as soon have censored - that despite high costs, they are teaching people at best to consume, obey, sleep - and not think, nope, that's dangerous to them. George Carlin had it right, they don't want people who can think.
This seems like a good feature to make their browser more attractive. Do they still report everything you do and everywhere you go back to Microsoft?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
They aren't real news, and they aren't fake news....
they're satirical news for purposes of humor, with such absurd topics that any literate person should immediately recognize the article content as satire past the first paragraph or so, even if they were living under a rock and didn't know what TheOnion was. Are they going to get the dreaded "Fake News Warning" anyways?
How is grandpa going to notice this new icon with all the toolbars installed?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
by NGOs, NATO, think tanks, former US gov workers, former US go mil.
With an OS level GUI direct over your browser on your smart phone.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
For a tool that claims they care about transparency they really do their best to prevent you from looking up a list of sites and their ratings.
If anyone is interested, I dug into the code for the chrome extension and grabbed their API URL so you can look up sites without having to install their extension:
- Trusted: CNN
- Trusted: Daily Caller
- Trusted: The Independent
- Trusted: Mother Jones (lol)
- Trusted: Huffington Post (lol)
- Trusted: The Daily Beast (lol)
- Trusted: BuzzFeed News (ok this is just sad)
- Not Trusted: Breitbart
- Not Trusted: Daily Mail
Looks fair and balanced to me.
Ad blockers and script changes can block gov/NGO and mil efforts to control the news.
So they go direct into the OS to control the browser and watch every link.
Click some news and an OS level GUI drops down over any browser used.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The gov/mil/NGO/former mil staff cant meme, cant report news, cant make funny art about their own side of politics.
To win over hearts and minds the idea is to go to the OS direct.
A GUI will drop down over any browser and alter the way the user interacts with the WWW on their own computer.
That will remove any ability to view and enjoy funny memes about wars, politics, to LOL at politicians who cant give a speech.
NGO/gov/mil/NATO and think tank control at the OS level over every link and OS connects to.
Changing a browser won't alter the OS level GUI dropping down.
Full 1984 in the big brand OS the consumer told to go look at a web site.
Now the OS will get between the user, their internet use and every link/site.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Why would I bother wading through all that drivel more than once?
Who evaluates the people who evaluate?
Anything that the media bigwigs don't like (ie anything not Leftist) will now be censored. Thank you for your cooperation.
For those that have not used Newsguard its a useful tool. Newsguard has done significant research and offers a comprehensive profile and a reason to believe/not believe the news source. If they come up with strikes against a news outlet they give that outlet the opportunity to refute their findings before the integrate the information into the their app.
So, how much do you think it would cost for sites to pay M$ to trust it. I think somewhere in the $50000-$500000 range.
They can pay ms as much as they want. Newsguard is a seperate company.
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
Why would I bother wading through all that drivel more than once?
What, you don't want to spend hours researching and refuting each point just so he can call you a shill and move on?
Wanna buy a shirt?
https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
It seems wrong to blame the media for reporting lies governments told that could not be independently verified. CNN, BBC etc. don't have their own weapons inspectors. Do you blame them for repeating "no obstruction!" and "no collusion!" too?
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
"Well, what do you think all these new censorship tools & systems are really for?"
Narrative control?
https://www.mintpressnews.com/...
"it will soon become almost impossible to avoid this neocon-approved news site’s ranking systems on any technological device sold in the United States ... the latest venture to result from the partnership between Steven Brill and Louis Gordon Crovitz"
https://www.newsguardtech.com/...
"Our Advisory Board - Tom Ridge, the first Secretary of Homeland Security (George W. Bush administration) - Richard Stengel, former editor of Time magazine and Undersecretary of State for Public Diplomacy (Obama administration) - (Ret.) General Michael Hayden, former Director of the CIA, former Director of the National Security Agency and former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence (George W. Bush administration) - Don Baer, chairman of Burson, Cohn & Wolfe and former White House Communications Director (Clinton administration) - Elise Jordan, political analyst, NBC, and former speechwriter for Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice - John Battelle, co-founding editor of Wired and founding chief executive of Industry Standard magazines - Jessica Lessin, founder and editor-in-chief of The Information"
First of all, did they report that Iraq has WMDs or that various intelligence agencies have stated that Iraq has WMDs? I'm betting it's the exclusively the latter. And how would the BBC or CNN verify the existence of WMDs in any case? Try to send a journalist to find and sneak into Iraq's secret military bases?
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
Oh look the Microsoft shills have mod points! Assholes.