- Fake News Roundup: In June 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and the torrent of disinformation about protection and prevention measures, Blasting News started the It's not true project, publishing a weekly roundup of some of the top fake news stories making the rounds on the web. Three years later, our editorial team has already debunked more than 750 false claims, helping readers to discern truth from falsehood.
- It’s not true newsletter: a weekly newsletter about disinfo and misinfo curated by BN Fact Check newsroom.
- Media literacy: Part of the Blasting News ethos is to continuously develop media literacy work with its readers and contributors, including writers, reviewers and content managers. In addition to the guidelines that form the basis of the platform's content policy, Blasting News Fact Check constantly promotes workshops and releases educational content covering specific topics of daily content production. Our latest venture in this direction was the creation, in partnership with Blasting News's creative department, of a series of 5 handbooks with tips and information on topics ranging from "Ten steps to write the perfect article" to "Nine steps to keep your article free from fake news".
- Enlight: The current approach to tackling fake news online has been mainly reactive, focusing on taking down misinformation before it spreads. Blasting News Fact Check believes that there is a need to shift towards a preventive and media literacy-oriented approach. With that in mind, we started the Enlight project, which aims to offer a web application that empowers readers and journalists to assess the credibility of news articles and sources themselves. The algorithm-based application uses a traffic light system to evaluate various aspects of an article, including metadata and images. By analyzing millions of news items and comparing them with over 100,000 sources, the algorithm provides an opinion on the veracity of the news while avoiding biases related to politics, race or gender.
- AMN and Blasting News Foundation: Blasting News is spearheading the establishment of a university network dedicated to researching and combatting disinformation. The Anti Misinformation Network (AMN) operates under the governance of The Blasting News Foundation, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting media literacy.
- Eunomia: Blasting News is part of the international consortium developing the Eunomia project, funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program. Eunomia is a decentralized and open-source social media platform that empowers users to determine the trustworthiness of the information they consume, actively encouraging democratic citizen participation in content verification by offering a scoring process that influences the reputation of content generators and sharers.
- Fake News Sicily: Blasting News played a pivotal role as the primary partner in an EU-funded research and innovation program aimed at creating an algorithm capable of detecting misinformation, fake news, and propaganda specifically at the local level. Over the course of a 3-year project, Blasting News successfully executed a comprehensive media literacy initiative in collaboration with a network of universities in Sicily. This endeavour included hosting multiple panel discussions featuring esteemed national and international professors and researchers, all focused on combating misinformation. Additionally, Blasting News published an English-language book in partnership with the esteemed publisher Peter Lang, further contributing to the understanding and mitigation of fake news. The ebook version of the book titled Information Disorder was made available for free download.
- IDMO data: Blasting News Fact Check regularly collaborates with the Italian Digital Media Observatory (IDMO), sharing its data on misinformation and false narratives on a monthly basis. This information is published by IDMO in its monthly report (in Italian).
- VaxFact with NewsGuard: In 2021, Blasting News partnered with a coalition of corporations, media organizations and nonprofits to initiate a health media literacy campaign aimed at empowering individuals with accurate information about vaccinations and preventing the spread of misinformation. As part of the VaxFacts campaign, families are granted free access to educational resources and tools like the HealthGuard browser extension developed by NewsGuard. Blasting News proudly served as one of the media partners.
- Electronic Town Meeting: Blasting News Fact Check organized and conducted five Electronic Town Meetings, fostering open discussions with the general public regarding the perils of disinformation in areas such as migrations, climate change, and health-related topics. To facilitate these events, we have established a dedicated website (in Italian), where participants can access relevant information, resources and the videos of all the ETMs.
Check our weekly roundups and our newsletter with the most shared fake news debunked.