WEST PALM BEACH, FL – NewsGuard, a journalism and technology tool that reportedly rates the credibility of news and information websites and tracks online misinformation. This week called by Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who referred to it as being part of what he called “Censorship Industrial Complex,” Especially in relation to the Orthodox point of view.
NewsGuard, founded in 2018 and funded by the US federal government, provides “trust rating” for news websites based on nine criteria related to a source’s journalistic practices; However, critics of the service have argued that if a site earns a negative rating, NewsGuard will actually serve to “take advertising revenue away from it”.Dislikestoward publications and the people they actively love.
The vast majority of sites that have lost advertising revenue as a result of NewsGuard’s practices are said to be conservative publications, costing them valuable traffic and taking away jobs from their reporters and staff.
Some of the criteria NewsGuard claims to use to judge a site include the frequency of misinformation; their sourcing and original reporting of information; the balance of news and opinion in his journalism; Heading accuracy, and many other factors.
Deciding which sites degree this information more than others — and how fairly — has been a hot-button topic lately, and at a House Weaponization of the Federal Government committee hearing held Thursday, Rep. Gaetz spoke on NewsGuard’s perceived bias in favor of left-leaning publications at the expense of conservative and right-leaning ones.
“In this city I’m used to seeing government officials pick their favorite outlets, and they give them the best scoops, they give them the best stories. It’s a mix of media and government that has long made me uncomfortable ‘ “But what we are describing now is actually the directing of revenue to some media companies over others, designed and implemented with funding and support from the US government.”
referring to newsguard as part of “Censorship Industrial Complex,” Gaetz called for a House investigation of the company’s activities, particularly with regard to allegations that they actively work to silence conservative voices and viewpoints on the Internet.
“If we don’t take a look at NewsGuard, we’ve failed,” he said. [Listen]
Currently, NewsGuard says it has evaluated Over 6,000 News Sites The US, UK, France, Germany and Italy account for 95% of online engagement with news.
