media credibility and crisis reporting

8/10/2019 Media Credibility and Crisis Reporting

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Media Credibility & Crisis Reporting

Reporting and Response in Crisis Situations

SATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM -- Curiosity is a human nature and hence people turn to different sources of information to satisfy their hunger. As the

centuries pass by, more and more information is being available, whether

through word of mouth, traditional media, or through mainstream digital

media. Open data is the new source of information that provides people with

the opportunity to have access to a wide network of knowledge, which they

can use to their advantage. Having easy access to all this knowledge

empowers citizens to be aware of their surroundings, be critical thinkers and

civic developers, and be able to make sound and clever decisions about theirlife and community. In terms of civic engagement, open data helps highlight

issues and problems which matter to the people of a community and brings

them into the public light for consideration. It also facilitates finding

solutions to these problems by being creative, critical developers and

applying innovative thinking to already existing data.

However this is not the case all the time. First and foremost, data is not

always available in its filtered form and most data out there is raw. Not all

information is credible and originates from a reliable source. Hence, people

fall into the trap of being mislead, which prevents them from making critical

analysis and finding solutions to their communitys problems. People are not

always protected from the fake information and usually rely on it without

verifying it.

Other times, there is too much information out there that people do not

know which information to take and which to discard. An example of this

would be the case of Wikileaks, where a vast amount of governmentalinformation that was considered private, was leaked for the public.

(Wikileaks, 2010) People and media were exposed to this vast amount in a

short time and they had no idea how to process it. In order to evaluate such

raw data and information, people need to be more media literate.


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However, as the speed and spread of internet increased, so did the

consumption of news by the public. Social media became another tool to

dispense and consume this valuable information to and by the general

population. Hence, the regulation of the information that was being made

public and that was accessible to a large group of people became weak. As

citizens became journalists, the practice of verifying each and every fact that

goes online, lost its importance. Twitter, Facebook, Reddit and blogs became

sources of information, not only for the public but also for the mainstream

media. Mainstream media and social media can often be seen interacting

with each other to dispel all this information around the world in real time.

With all this information presented, it leads us to question the credibility ofthe information and news presented to us by the media. If a disaster

happens or a crisis breakouts and information is flowing

from different directions continuously and un- relentlessly, it is hard to

monitor the truthfulness of information and hence its credibility is

jeopardized. As a result, this false information is internalized by

the citizens and taken as the truth which might lead to unintended reactions.

On April 15, 2013 two bombs exploded during Boston marathon and the first

photo was uploaded on Facebook within a couple of minutes resulting in 24

hours of media frenzy where social and mainstream media fed off each other


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causing every speculation and rumour about suspects / bombing to be

treated as legitimate news. (The Guardian, 2013)

Similarly, on April 24, 2013 a tweet from Associated Press (AP) twitter

account mentioning an attack on White House and president Obama beinginjured was published. This tweet got re-tweeted 6000 times within a few

minutes and turned out to be a hoax later on. This had negative implications

on the citizens and on the US stock market. The citizens were in a panic

mode and hence AP lost the people s credibility to it. Readers were as ked

not to believe any news or information that is tweeted for at least a couple

of days and until further notice. As for the US stock market, the Dow Jones

dropped down by about 143 points. Once the information was cleared it

gained its previous status back. (Hootsuite, 2013)

Each case had its own ramifications and severely impacted the lives of the

public and economy of the country. In these two cases, false information

was presented to the public from news sources that were considered to be

credible sources. Negative consequences of these news affected the lives of

citizens and endangered their safety. This poses the argument of what

people must do in order to verify the information presented and be able to

better protect themselves.

This raises the question, how much do we trust the birds to bring us the

right information?


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MEDIA ANALYSES ITSELF AFTER BOSTON BOMBING

BACKGROUND

On 15 April 2013, two bombs went off, just as the Boston Marathon was

winding down. Immediately reports about the bomb started appearing on

social media sites like Twitter and Facebook. What followed was media

frenzy as social media and mainstream media fed news off each other. News

about suspects and their arrests spread as soon as it broke on social media

site Reddit and was soon picked up by Mainstream media like CNN and The

New York Post but turned about to be rumours and false information.

Thus in the event of a crisis, when news, rumours and false information was

flowing incessantly and rapidly, it was hard to sift through it and decide what

speculation was and what hard facts were.

After bombings, social media informs (and misinforms)


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This is an analysis on the role of social media during Boston bombing where

it sheds light on the inappropriateness of the news information. This article

successfully presents the case and some of the implications that happened.

However, it does not fully presents the negative implication that it had on

people s lives and how it affected them or give a live example of theinvestigations that took place.

Social Media Vigilantes Cloud Boston Bombing Investigation

This is an analysis of social media and its effect on the coverage of the

Boston bombing. This analysis shows how the wrong rumours actually

affected the lives of others. NPR does a good job in giving a sample example

of how the news information affected the investigations and sheds light on

how this has affected the lives of innocent people.

WATCH: Jon Stewart slams CNN's Boston bombing coverage


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does not mention the hoax itself but the negative impact of the hoax and

correctly presents the issue as is.

AP Hack Illustrates Real Consequences of Poor Social Media Security

This shows how insecure and vulnerable is the social media. This blog articledoes a great job in first discussing the issue in brief about the hoax and then

presenting the negative consequences that it had on the US market. It goes

further to also use this as an example to other brands and how false

information on social media can have fatal results.

SEC, FBI probe fake tweet that rocked stocks

This article shows how social media can be used for a negative effect. It

presents the negative consequences in a cohesive manner form. However, it

has mentioned that the Syrian Electronic army were behind the hoax and

failed to mention the proof they had or the source of information to attain

better credibility.

The power of one wrong tweet

Hide Infographic

This is an analysis of Twitter's power and how it can be manipulated. This is

an interesting analysis of twitter itself on the AP news hoax as an example

and the ripple effect. The analysis was done in an unbiased and educatedway
http://www.salzburg.umd.edu/unesco/media-credibility-crisis-reportinghttp://www.salzburg.umd.edu/unesco/media-credibility-crisis-reportinghttp://www.salzburg.umd.edu/unesco/media-credibility-crisis-reporting


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Show Exercises

1) The first exercise will be arranging a debate or discussion session what

are the benefits and the downside of a 24 hour news cycle. What impact, if

any, do you think it has on the credibility of the stories? The objective of this

exercise would be to raise awareness among the students about false

information and aims at preparing them to be better critical thinkers in

evaluating the news information they are receiving.

Sample questions will include the following:

o How can you identify false data and information from true information?

How can you identify reliable sources? o What sample measures or precautions do you use or follow to make

sure that the information is true and not false? o What are the criteria or some cues or flag raising items that make you

identify a true news feed, FB post, tweet etc. from a false one?

2) A second exercise would be a practical exercise where students will be

asked to identify 5 Twitter accounts that have the ability to create an impact

similar to the AP tweet hoax case. It can be an account of a news outlet, orthe leader of a nation or a celebrity.

3) The next exercise will give an opportunity to the students to discuss a

case where they came across a false piece of news and how it affected their

life. They will have about 10 minutes to come up with their case, and then

they will be asked to share the information with their classmates. Each

student gets about 2 minutes to share the information. After all the students

have shared the information, they will be given about 20 minutes for open

discussion and to comment on each other s stories as well as mention the

similarities. As a second part of the exercise, students can get together in to

groups and pick up a case from those presented and come up with a

presentation that can then be discussed in class. Students would be asked to


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make it interactive and engaging for their fellow students. They will be

interacting with one ano ther and learning from each others experiences

about how such false news has affected their lives in a negative way and

how has it added value to their data and information search. The purpose of

this exercise would be to encourage students to be fully aware of thenegative implications and consequences of one wrong information and how it

can affect the lives of others in the same manner the negative tweets or

posts has affected their lives.

4) In the next exercise, students will be asked to identify the words that

have a potential of attracting people and general public s attention. For eg,

words like bombing, crash, attack, injured, crisis, shooting etc. Students will

then be asked to search for tweets having these words and check the

number of time such tweets are re-tweeted. This will give students a chance

to understand how important people consider these words to be and its

impact on the spread of news.

5) A next exercise would be that a teacher gives out a small intuitive and

informative lecture about how students can identify false information from

true information and how to filter out data and information that is of use to

the public and individuals followed by a hand on exercise. After that a step

by step sheet would be handed out or a news filtering rubric would behanded out (see below). The rubric includes detailed information on how to

filter information depending on the sources and credibility, and how to

evaluate sources and news information. Then students would be given a set

of tweets, posts, and news information and would be asked to identify which

ones were true and which ones were false. At the end they would share the

information with their teammates and discuss what was misleading to them.

6) News Filtering Rubric:

o It is a re-tweet from someone you trust o Author has verifiable expertise o Author is someone you follow o Author is someone you've heard of


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o Account has a verification seal o Author tweets often on the topic o Author has many tweets on the same topic o Personal photo as avatar o Author often mentioned and RT o Author is geographically near the topic

Hide Analysis Criteria

ACCESS

People should have access to different news media sources for them to be

able to receive their news about a certain issue from different media sources

where they are able to better evaluate the news information they are

receiving. As a foremost important thing, citizens should have access to theinternet and to different social media tools as well as mainstream media and

digital media for their information. They should be able to freely access news

sources that are of an interest to them and be able to have access to the

type of news that is important to them.

o What do you consider open-data is or constitutes of? o What type of data or information do you think should be freely

available to the public? o Find and discuss cases where people from different communities have

different restrictions imposed on them when accessing data. o What barriers do people experience when trying to access different

sources of information or news media outlets? o What sources (websites, blogs, social media tools, mainstream media,

and digital media) you turn to for information on current affairs in your

country?

o Where do you get most of your news updates from: print, tv or socialmedia?

o How do you think social media contributed to your/people's news

consumption habits?


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AWARENESS

Citizens should be aware of the news around them and have the right to be

updated about the cases around them as well. Certain campaigns should be

held to create awareness among citizens that not all news information is true

and that not all sources of information are credible sources. They should also

be encouraged to check their sources before believing the information and

as a second level to check the news information on that source site by

comparing it to other media coverage of the same issue. Awareness should

be built around protecting the citizens from falling into the trap of believing

everything first hand.

o Does particular media coverage of a disaster/event encourage greater

civic engagement, promote a local/global conversation? For example,in what way does news about a certain issue or disaster encourage

people to take action towards that certain issue and create a solution

for it or positive change? As an example, the rape cases in Egypt that

were covered on blogs and mainstream media, encouraged citizens to

take action for women empowerment and try to stop rape in Egypt.

This is created a global conversation about women s rights and

protection against rape. o Certain events are more likely to be reported / covered by the media

over others. Find and discuss the 12 significant news values that are

thought to be criteria for news selection. o List of the news values o What campaigns or interactive activities would you carry among your

community and society to raise awareness about media credibility

issues? Perhaps maybe in schools, universities, clubs. o It took about 3 years from the very first tweet to the billionth tweet:

discuss various ways twitter is being used across the world; how itbenefited societies?

ASSESSMENT


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Once citizens have access to different news sources and information and

awareness is built that not every type of news is true, citizens should be

taught how to be critical thinkers and assess the information they receive by

following a certain rubric. Questions they could ask themselves would range

from identifying the author of the article and what other articles that authorhas published, the date of the news and time it was written, the source of

information or website and what type of news it presents, how often that

site or media tool reports important and right or credible source of

information, and what are the sources used in that news information that

enabled it to gather this information and present it to the public. Citizens

should be able to analyze and evaluate the information presented before

believing everything being said.

o Does media have the power, and to what extent, to encourage a

conversation across borders? For example, what issue relative to a

certain country was portrayed through media and has raised a flag on

that issue to be discussed in other countries as well? o Find media coverage on the same issue/event across various outlets

and platforms, and analyze how the coverage differs from each other. o What power do social media have to drive or encourage civic

engagement? o How important are social media outlets for a newsroom? o Does news on the digital news platforms reflect the patterns of news

selection/ news values ? o What are the old habits and ways twitter has replaced? o What issues and negative outcomes can be related to Twitter? o Journalists in this day and age are no longer deciding what information

the public should know but instead are helping audiences make sense

of it. To what extent do you agree or disagree? Can you provideexamples?

APPRECIATION


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There should be an appreciation of media credibility across cultures and the

diversity it presents. Perhaps citizens can learn from other countries how

credibility is achieved and what measures are taken and hence apply it in

their own country. Citizens can also learn the precautions and measures

taught in other countries and try to tailor it to adjust their own needs in theirown country.

o What are the examples of media acting as a platform for societies and

communities to come together for a shared goal/concern? o What issues have media raised up and pushed in your local

community/achieved a social change? o The Internet continues to evolve into a major news source. How do

you perceive the credibility of online news information inrelation/regards to more traditional sources?

o Do you believe there are forces that can either inhibit or aid the flow of

news items through the "gates" (the gate-keeping theory)? Discuss

and expand on.

ACTION

Once all the above is attained. Citizens must push for news outlets to verifytheir information and present true information to the public. They would

push and ask for their right of valid and credible news information with

reliable sources as well.

o How can you use social media to attract great attention to your cause,

concern? o What measures would you take or what would you do to educate other

members of your society and community to better identify crediblesources online to be engaged citizens?

o What forms of media can you use to gather information about a topic?


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media credibility and crisis reporting

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