“Pope Francis shocks the world, endorses Donald Trump for President! WikiLeaks confirms Hillary Clinton sold weapons to ISIS!” Both statements are bold and shocking, but they are fake. The fake news story about The Pope endorsing Donald Trump for President picked up 960,000 engagements on Facebook, while the story involving Clinton’s business deals with ISIS generated around 780,000 engagements, according to Buzzfeed. These fake news stories along with many others have been a common sight on many social media websites during and even after the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election. Many voters with strong biases toward a particular candidate would like, comment, and share a post that would hurt the reputation and credibility of the other candidate, no matter how questionable and reliable the source is. But what exactly is fake news, and how has it become so popular? Another question we must ask ourselves is how we can spot fake news and even prevent it. 

We have heard President Donald Trump and many others repeatedly say the term, “fake news.” But what exactly does the term fake news mean? “Fake news, or hoax news, refers to false information or propaganda published under the guise of being authentic news. Fake news websites and channels push their fake news content in an attempt to mislead consumers of the content and spread misinformation via social networks and word-of-mouth” (Stroud). President Trump along with many of his supporters would claim that news organizations such as CNN, MSNBC, CBS, and many others were fake news. Sometimes news organizations misinform the American people, by stating the wrong facts that were initially believed, but this is not done on purpose. However, many news organizations tend to have a bias politically, and this often makes the viewer unaware of the full context of the issue, this is an argument for another day. President Trump has made it clear, that any news media that disagrees with his agenda will be deemed as fake news. This is not the true definition of fake news. Just because you disagree with the position that a news channels has made or what was written in an article, does not mean you can classify it as fake news. The article / production must contain false information. 

Fake news dates back hundreds of years ago. It was common for news to be not entirely accurate, however the lack of technology gave good reason for that. But today, with the use of internet, people can research topics from around the world. Many different news forums are posted for many people to see. With the advancement in technology, the amount of content that is online today is way more than ever before. With the large content on the internet today, there are many sources which distribute fake news articles. Over the Presidential Election of 2016, the number of fake news articles began to increase, and many articles became popular on different social media websites. As previously stated, there has been fake news before in previous decades and even centuries, but what made fake news so popular in 2016? There a number of reasons behind this. For starters, the 2016 was the first real election with a large social media involvement. 

“This election has been the first “significant” social media influenced election. Among 18-29 year olds, nearly two thirds said social media is the most helpful means of learning new things about politics, according to a study conducted by the Pew Research Center. Overall, The Pew Research Center found that 44% of Americans said they learned something new in one week in April during the primaries through social media.” (Lang 161-163)

By using social media as a main source for gathering news information regarding the election and political affairs, people were more exposed to fake news articles, rather than if they watched a news channel or got their news from a reliable source. Many people believed that stories with absurd titles and claims, but many have good reason to. Many of the fake news articles online were crafted and created in a way that made the article look like it was from a reliable source. Some websites would make small changes even in the title, by making it sound like a reliable news source. An example of this would be ABCnews.com.co. This website looks like it says ABC news, but the articles and content posted on this website is much different than what was actually posted on ABC news. Small changes like this seem to not be a problem for many people to spot out as fake, but for many viewers, this was a mistake that was believable. 

Another reason why fake news has become so popular and so many fake news article are posted is because there is money to be made when writing fake news articles. With every view, like, and share, the creator of a fake news article can make a nice profit. Paul Horner, a fake news writer told the Washington Post that he makes close to $10,000 a month from Google AdSense. “The money comes from ads, provided by the self-service ad technology of companies such as Facebook and Google.” (Ohlheiser) With the profit that can be made by creating fake news articles, it gives many people a reason to write fake news articles, even when they know they might convince many people that the fake information they are writing about, will actually believe that it is true. 

A third reason why fake news has become so popular in 2016 is because of the political party bias that exists today. “Partisan bias fuels unreliable news because people from both parties: Republican and Democrat are bad at figuring out what news stories to believe. Instead, they trust instant articles/news stories as if they were reliable.” (Taub) Today, there is a strong political bias between both parties. With the 2016 Presidential election just ending, we saw how divided many Americans are regarding party. This also has a strong link to the rise of fake news. Many people who are very passionate and one-sided about a particular party or presidential candidate, typically believe in a story which will hurt their opponent’s credibility. Most people when they see an article about how the party candidate, which they do not like, will not typically care to research about the article, because it is beneficial to their candidate. Many Americans have become more trustworthy when it comes to viewing articles and believing that they are true. As a result of this trust, we have seen a rise in the number of fake news articles, and stories. 

With the rise of fake news articles increasing every day, the American people must be able to recognize and spot fake news articles when they see one. Some articles can be simple to spot a fake news article while others might be more challenging. The Washington Post made a short video detailing steps on how to spot fake news. The video explains that to spot fake news,  a person should double check the URL. By double checking the URL, a viewer can spot if a website has an abnormal URL that ends with ( .com.co ) rather than a .org, or .gov. The video tells how to spot if a photo is photo shopped. Most photo shopped photos can easily be checked by writing a description of the photo in a search engine. Most likely by searching the details of the photo, a person can find the original picture before it was photo shopped. Another step that people can take to spot fake news is to check on the original source that is in the suspicious article. Some fake news articles will have a link in the article itself. By clicking on the link, a viewer can see if the link is a legitament article or a study. A final step that can help people spot fake news is to download extensions that are similar to an application to verify if articles/websites are legitimate.  One extension that can help spot fake news is B.S. Detector. “B.S. Detector is a Chrome extension that “warns users about unreliable news sources.” The software makes it easy for you to identify fake or even satirical news sites, plus sources of questionable reliability.” (Bolluyt) Another application/ website that can help spot fake news stories and false statements made by politicians is Politifact. “Pulitzer Prize-winning website PolitiFact is available in app form for both Android and iOS. Instead of flagging questionable sources, the app enables you to check the statements made by politicians, political pundits, or other people on the internet.” (Bolluyt) 
