Online misinformation has a common theme, the longer you take to think about it and the more you deliberate on its truthfulness the lower the chances of falling victim to misinformation. The very biggest self-protective behavior possible is simply taking time and being cautious when dealing with any information online. Pennycook and others found that forcing yourself to slow down and think about what is happening greatly increases the chances that misinformation is intercepted before it causes any problems (2020). When looking at fake news online we tend to be so distracted by the large amount of information and activity online that we forget to think about the truthfulness of the information or we don't care about sharing it even when we realize it's false (Pennycook et al., 2020). In relation to scams, since most of them rely on immediate strong emotions just taking a second to step back and "cool down" is a great safeguard against them. Remember no matter what you are doing that it can wait a few seconds or minutes so that no mistakes are made.

Online misinformation, specifically fake news, is almost always related to current news and world events, so staying informed on what the current events are is arguably the best way of avoiding fake news. Because fake news can be hard to tell apart from legitimate news it is important to do your own research using good sources to confirm that the information is accurate. Simply remembering to rate the accuracy of an article can greatly reduce the sharing of false information online (Effron & Raj, 2019). This also applies to online scams. Email phishing, phone scams, catfishing, and advertisements usually follow general trends that can be followed using the web. If anything seems suspicious a quick search online will often yield results on similar scams, patterns, or profiles of current scams. Because certain groups are more likely to be taken advantage of they must be more careful and stay more informed about current ongoing scams. Realize that no one is impervious to online misinformation, everyone must be careful at all times.

Although it is always best to stay informed and remain vigilant, it is not entirely up to the individual to be responsible for online misinformation. The multiple different applications, websites, and companies are also responsible for this misinformation being presented on their websites. For each type of internet application and each type of misinformation, different precautions must be used. For example, fake news on social media sites should be monitored and warnings should be given to remind users to stop and think. Although not foolproof, giving people warnings greatly reduces the likelihood that they will share false information (Pennycook et al., 2020). It is important to note that sometimes even when we're warned about false information, we ignore it and share it anyways, so forcing users to deliberate on accuracy is important (Effron & Raj, 2019).  That method of giving warnings for each piece of false information can still be useful for things like email scams, however, there are so many emails that it is very impractical to label them all. Because of that, instead of individual warnings, large corporations like banks will give an initial warning that none of their legit emails will ask you to give up personal information. It is important for large corporations and businesses to address misinformation so that it doesn't get out of hand.