If this election has taught us anything, it’s that people don’t know the difference between real news sites and fake ones. I feel that it is my civic duty as a student to educate others on how to properly discern between credible and deceptive news sites. These are rules and criteria that I have picked up from one of my anthropology classes that deals with conventional research skills; namely distinguishing proper literature that can be used in research papers from improper literature. These rules and criteria are not limited to the academic setting; they extend to casual settings -browsing Facebook news- as well. That said, I believe we should make it a habit to verify the news sources that our parents and grandparents send us on social media. I should mention, that in research if any one or more of these criteria are not met then the entire site is not credible and should be avoided. I encourage others to adopt this approach in their casual lives as well; if it isn’t tolerated in a research paper, why should it be tolerated in our primary news feed?

Before I begin I should also mention that in the academic setting, news sources are rarely used as literature. This is because it is conventional to cite primary literature, which is literature that reports raw data and information, in order to interpret how and what the data means in the research paper. Huffington Post, although verified, can’t substitute a government, organization, or educational website. That is, it is standard to cite websites that end with gov, org, or edu in their domain. So I will only go over the three criteria relevant to verifying a website; we are looking for news, not raw data to interpret. Without further ado, below are the three criteria for verifying web sources.

1. A proper news site’s writing should not be laden with errors

Before you read an article, take time to “read” it; that is, scan It. Look over the actual writing and language used in the paper. You would expect a professional journalist to type these articles like any other online news site; it is a “news” site isn’t it? Thus, you would expect said journalist(s) to be learned in the most basic rules of syntax and grammar. Now this isn’t to say that if there are a few minor mistakes here and there, then it is no longer credible. Journalists are human, and humans make mistakes; however an article with too many grammatical, syntax, and vocabulary errors should raise a red flag in your mind. Journalists can make mistakes, just not too many.

2. Look for information about the site

Typically, websites will have information about themselves listed in a separate area. This includes the journalists/columnists that write for the site, what they write about, and contact information. You should be able to find out exactly who writes for the site and, most importantly, how to contact them. This information can be commonly found in an “about us,” “who we are,” “contact us,” or “what we do” page listed in the site. Now just because a site has a tab titled “about us” doesn’t mean it will have this information present; take the time to look for the above mentioned information. When you have found their contact information, verify them. People can easily fake an email, phone number, or fax number. Give yourself two to three days for an email response and make several attempts to call them, on separate days, before dismissing their contact information.

3. Look for credentials and contacts of the authors

Perhaps the article you’re reading has passed the first and second criteria, what then? Look at the author of the article. You want to make sure that they are qualified to do what they do and-well- exist! Most online articles will have their author listed at the beginning or end of the piece. What you should be looking for proper credentials. There should be information about the author that states their credentials; whether they were previously occupied (and if so where) and-or where they graduated come to mind. Also crucial is the contact information. An author should have their contact information present; their email, phone number, even links to their social media are valid. A professional journalist will have these things listed like this site does. The author of this article has both her occupation mentioned and her personal contact information listed on their profile. Judging by her verified twitter account, this author does exist and is qualified to be senior politics editor of the Huffington Post.

Verification does not mean the site will be unbiased, it just means the site isn’t fake and thus has a bit of credibility in that manner. To put this into better perspective, consider the following example. Breitbart has their contact information listed as well as a job listing page. Breitbart is not a fake news site… but it’s not a good one either due to its strong bias. A spectrum of credibility exists; some sites can be more credible than others. This all depends on the level of bias associated with the site; for example The New York Times is more credible than Salon because it has a lower bias. So whether you’re looking for a site to get your news from or just debating with grandma on Facebook, remember that these criteria only apply in verifying the source. They’re going to help you weed out fake news sites, not bad ones.