It’s International Fact-Checking Day, an event to highlight the work of fact-checkers around the world.
In a message marking the day, Angie Drobnic Holan, director of the the International Fact-Checking Network, noted the recent challenges faced by fact-checkers, including a loss of funding and attacks on fact-checkers and their organizations.
“This is indeed a crisis for fact-checkers, but it’s even worse for the general public,” Holan said Wednesday. “Disinformation hurts people. It has real-world consequences. Without fact-checking, more grandparents will fall victim to financial scams. Adults will refuse to vaccinate children against proven killers like measles. Teens will read faked reports of current events with no way to tell them apart from the real thing.”
The IFCN launched in 2015, started the event in 2016 and has more than 170 members around the world. Each signatory has been vetted and approved by independent assessors. They are required to show a commitment to nonpartisanship and transparency, about both sources and funding.
AP Fact Check is a member of the IFCN, a unit of the Poynter Institute.
Getting the facts right has been core to AP’s mission since our founding in 1846. When a public figure says something questionable, it is our job to investigate it and offer the facts.
It appears the AP’s first stand-alone political fact check was written Nov. 9, 1993, around a debate between Vice President Al Gore and businessman Ross Perot on the merits of the North American Free Trade Agreement, often referred to as NAFTA. From there it has grown from fact-checking politicians’ speech to checking for false and misleading information that gains widespread traction online. You can find those stories here.
We also do live fact-checking around events like presidential addresses, political debates and campaign events.
As with all AP staff, AP fact checkers must adhere to the company’s Statement of News Values, which states: “AP employees must avoid behavior or activities — political, social or financial — that create a conflict of interest or compromise our ability to report the news fairly and accurately, uninfluenced by any person or action.”
Learn more from AP’s Statement of News Values and Principles.
