How to Spot Social Media Misinformation on Election Day
(And every other day, too)
On this particularly fraught U.S. Election Day, there are all sorts of ways to participate productively in the defense of our democracy, from casting your own ballot to encouraging others to cast theirs to working at or watching the polls. But there is at least one small thing you can do from the comfort of your living room or office, and that is to avoid spreading election-related misinformation — or better yet, actively combat it.
I wrote in March about one digital literacy expert’s carefully honed, appealingly simple method for spotting online misinformation about the coronavirus. It’s called SIFT, and it works equally well for election-related falsehoods. (Spoiler: It doesn’t rely primarily on your critical thinking skills, or even your common sense.)
Speaking of election-related falsehoods, there is no more energetic collector and debunker of those than the BuzzFeed duo of Jane Lytvynenko and Craig Silverman. As they have done with countless past news events, the pair will be spending the…
