It may seem clear to you that the image in which Barack Obama and David Cameron are kissing their spouses has been doctored (篡改) and cut together. But out on the Internet, not everyone will see it that way.
After the 2016 election, Facebook created a program to fact — check posts. They started paying organizations like Reuters and Politifact to mark content like this. Another agency looked through thousands of marked posts and saw all sorts of misinformation. Much of it was manipulated (操纵的) content—something that started off real but was later changed in some way to convey incorrect information. Some of those were doctored photos that were presented as real.
But many more were photos that weren't doctored. They were just not what the poster claimed. Like this photo: Dr. Anthony Fauci and Obama supposedly visiting “the Wuhan lab” in 2015 with Melinda Cates. The photo is “real”—it comes from the NIH. But that' s not Wuhan, it's Maryland. And that's not even Melinda Gates. We saw a lot of examples like this. And don' t think a post isn't manipulated just because it has numbers in it. The person who posted this map said it showed the number of missing children by county in Ohio last year. This is real data that really comes from the Ohio Attorney General' s office. Although it actually shows missing children reports, that's misleading. There were 20 ,000 reports in 2018, but less than 2% of those children were still missing when the report was published. Nearly all of them were safely recovered that year.
Unfortunately, we can't rely on just Facebook's fact—checking partners to prevent misinformation. Only a small part of the millions of posts circulating every day on the platform can be checked. According to the News Literacy Project, consumers should keep an eye on where a piece of information is coming from. Is it a reliable news agency? Are other news organizations reporting similar information? Where did an image or video first appear?
Misinformation often plays upon emotional responses. So if a questionable bit of information leaves you in anger, it may be manipulated content trying to manipulate you.
【小题1】Why did Facebook create the program?| A．To delete misleading posts. | B．To correct misinformation. |
| C．To analyze misinformation. | D．To check misleading posts. |
| A．Misinformation is originally unreal. |
| B．A post containing real data is reliable. |
| C．A post having numbers is easily believed. |
| D．Ohio is not a safe place for children. |
| A．manipulate readers. | B．avoid checking. |
| C．earn more money. | D．amuse readers. |
| A．All Sorts of Misinformation |
| B．Unavoidable Misinformation |
| C．Doctored Photos on Facebook |
| D．Manipulated Misinformation on the Internet |
