Google, YouTube spend MILLIONS to launch Global Fact Check Fund
The move, which marks the companies' largest fact-checking grant to date, comes as they continue to ramp up their fight against "misinformation" online.
On Tuesday, Google
and YouTube announced that they will be providing a
$13.2 million grant to the nonprofit Poynter Institute's International Fact Checking Network with the goal of
launching a new "Global Fact Check Fund," set to launch in
early 2023.
The move, which marks
the companies' largest fact-checking grant to date, comes as they
continue to ramp up their fight against "misinformation"
online.
According to Google and YouTube, the grant will "support
[the Poynter Institute's] network of 135 fact-checking organizations from 65
countries covering over 80 languages."
The companies justified their
decision by noting that "helping people to identify misinformation is a
global challenge."
"The Global Fact
Check Fund," they explained, "will help fact-checkers to scale
existing operations or launch new ones that elevate information, uplift credible
sources and reduce the harm of mis- and disinformation around the globe."
Organizations are
expected to use the funding to "incorporate new technologies, create or
expand digital footprints, optimize verification tools, and increase their
capacities to deepen audience engagement through innovative storytelling
formats such as audio, video, or podcasts."
"The world needs
fact-checking more than ever before," IFCN executive director Baybars
Örsek said. "This partnership with Google and YouTube infuses financial
support to global fact-checkers and is a step in the right direction, and while
there’s much work to be done, this partnership has sparked meaningful
collaboration and an important step.
In recent years, investments in programs aimed at tackling mis- and
disinformation online have grown in tandem with peoples' interest and awareness
in the subject.
According to data from Google, in October 2022,
interest in mis- and disinformation across the world reached its highest point
since 2004, when records began, with the most pressing topic being the Covid-19
pandemic.
During the pandemic, big
tech's fact-checking apparatus went into overdrive as companies struggled to
keep up with information that seemed to be changing on a daily, if not hourly
basis.
YouTube has been
criticized for its crackdowns on those who shared ideas that
opposed the mainstream, many of whom have had their views vindicated in the
months since.
https://thepostmillennial.com/google-youtube-spend-millions-to-launch-global-fact-check-fund
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