Fact-checking
how you verify information and identify manipulated content
Fact-checking is how you verify claims and spot content that has been altered or faked. It covers checking quotes, images, video, and the chain behind a piece of information. AI can help flag possible manipulation and trace sources, but it can also be wrong, so the question is how confident you can be in what it tells you.
Questions to explore
- How do you verify a claim, image, or video before it reaches publication today?
- What kinds of manipulated content are hardest for your team to catch?
- Where could AI tools help you check sources, detect edits, or trace an image to its origin?
- How would you handle an AI tool that labels something fake when it is real, or real when it is fake?
- What level of certainty do you need before you publish, and who signs off on it?
Expert voices
“Which AI tools, and which professional skills, help recognize fake videos and images generated by AI?”
“Demand for verification tools in training stays low despite high need. Ask why that gap exists.”
“In crisis reporting, AI helps sift the noise, but verification remains key. It is better to be second and correct than first and spreading rumors.”
“As AI accelerates content production everywhere, journalists are pushed into verifying what already exists instead of reporting something new. That shifts labor from discovery to defense, and it exhausts the people doing truth-checking.”
Things to consider
- AI detection tools can be confidently wrong, so treat their output as one input among several.
- Keep a record of how each fact was checked, not just the final verdict.
- A failed automated check still needs a human to make the call.
Pull Fact-checking when it is relevant and set it aside when it is not. Pair it with the other Journalism cards, lay them out on a table, and use the questions above to get everyone on the same page. Capture what you discuss on sticky notes or in a shared doc.
More Journalism cards
