Fake news is....

• Disinformation for profit - hoax sites who engineer fake news stories to reap digital advertising revenue

• Disinformation for political gain - state-funded fraudulent websites set up by one country to sow confusion in another

• Hacking - Hackers gain access to the websites or social media accounts of reputable news outlets and disseminate fake stories.

• Viral pranks - hoaxes spread for fun

• Uncritically reporting a hoax as fact: a well-crafted hoax spreads widely enough that a credible news outlet reports on it as fact or as a rumor

Fake news is NOT....

• Satire Websites: Websites like The Onion write news parodies. Readers who don’t know it’s satire may mistake it for fact.

• Satirical stories from regular news sites: Opinion and feature writers in mainstream media will sometimes use satire or fanciful hypothetical examples to make a point.

• Honest reporting mistakes: Even the best reporters sometimes get things wrong, report things as fact before they’re confirmed or get spun by sources who aren’t telling the whole truth. But if there’s no intention to fool anyone, it’s not fake news.

• Journalism you don’t like: Just because you don’t like what the author says, that doesn’t make it fake news.

To Test Your Fake News Judgment, Play Factitious