Facebook leads consortium to counter fake news

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New York: To ensure the news that internet users get is not fake, Facebook is leading a consortium that is pouring $14 million into the creation of a News Integrity Initiative.

Apart from academics and non-profits, Mozilla and Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales are also part of the consortium.

The News Integrity Initiative aims to develop tools that will help people be sensitive towards stories they read online.

'The City University of New York Graduate School of Journalism will administer the initiative and will spearhead new literacy and aim to increase trust in journalism around the world,' a news release on the website of CUNY Graduate School of Journalism said.

After US President Donald Trump was declared winning candidate in 2016 presidential elections, Facebook came under severe criticism for promoting and breeding fake news on its platform.

To fight the fake news and re-build its credibility, the networking giant announced a number of projects and users to identify and weed out fake stories.

'The initiative will address the problems of misinformation, disinformation and the opportunities the internet provides to inform the public conversation in new ways,' Facebook`s head of news partnerships, Campbell Brown, said in a statement.