Contents

• Summary
• Analysis
• Response
• Source

Description

In the article ‘Why do we fall for fake news?’ published on December 8, 2016 in ‘The Conversation’ an independent source of news and views sourced from academic and research community, the author S. Shyam Sundar highlights the increase in amount of online fake news and how public ignores the credibility of the source. The author discusses how fake news has been circulated online since decades and the readers are so ignorant and do not bother about the credibility of the source neither do they make efforts to know the main source of the news. The article has been addressed to people of all ages who read news on different online platforms. The article highlights that in today’s age of social media the fake news or any hoax can go viral very easily and reach millions even without proper fact-checking. The author emphasizes that people do not pay attention to the source, its accuracy, fairness and objectivity and consider every source as credible as journalistic source. The article highlights that the layered sources of internet news has made the professional news agencies who are the original gatekeepers for credibility of the news has taken a back seat. The increased number of sources of one news items is considered to be one of the reason. People look for the original source only if the news is important. The author also highlights that increasing trust in friends and peers weaken the cognitive abilities to identify the real and fake news and people believe in the news shared by friends and peers more than the news experts. People tend to get stuck in the personal space created on Facebook and Twitter or their own customized news portal where fake news is easily circulated and people are less likely to scrutinize the fake news instead they are more likely to believe it as we have increased trust on our friends and our choices and hence consider the sources found on out customized page and social media account share by friends are real and do not bother checking credibility of the source of news.