“Verified. Media” is a fundamentally independent fact, equidistant from political parties, movements, and public figures. Our priority is the preservation of objectivity and impartiality. Objects of factsching in our project can become any persons, media or organizations - their statements, publications, voiced numbers, etc. Our technique is based on international standards, open sources and factory -checking tools available to the reader.
“Verified. Media” as the organization does not support any political party or candidate, does not call to vote for any kind of political party or candidate, does not give recommendations related to the support of politicians, and does not participate in any pre-election campaigns.
“Verified. Media” fundamentally focuses on international legislation, as well as UN recognized values and ethical norms. In order to comply with the principle of neutrality, permanent authors cannot simultaneously be in political parties, work for the government of a country or a company under the control of a political party or government. Also, to exclude the conflict of interests, the authors cannot write about the organizations in which they work. In the event of a conflict of interests regarding the subject of verification, the material is transmitted to another factor.
Employees “Verified. Media” are prohibited from accepting any gifts, services and other benefits within their professional activities that go beyond the manifestations of politeness or household social interactions. In case of detection of such gifts, this is subject to discussion at the general meeting of the editorial office. If it is found that a similar gift was handed to the employee as a fee for violation of principles and methodology or support for the political party/candidate or commercial company, relations with the employee must be broken, and the detected violations are corrected in accordance with "The rules for making changes and additions to published materials".
When checking the statements “verified. Media” will not concentrate on verifying the statements of any side of the political, military, commercial, legal or other conflict and equally checks the statements of all parties if they meet the selection criteria.
A person whose statements have become the subject of analysis has the right to challenge the verdict using the feedback form. It is “verified” to conduct an additional analysis of such a material (if necessary - with the involvement of independent experts) and if inaccuracies are detected, carry out the correction procedure in accordance with “The rules for making changes and additions to published materials".
What we check and how to choose statements for verification
Objects of verification can only be factual statements (including visual), but not opinions, assumptions or forecasts.
The main selection criteria:
- fundamental verification of the approval (specificity, its connectedness with objective measured and verified reality, on the one hand, and the ability of a journalist to verify the statements using only open data and his resources, on the other);
- the level of relaying the statement in the Russian -speaking segment of the Internet (the number of citation and references to the media, stability of belief in society);
- social significance of the statement;
- public interest in saying
The basic check scheme
- HIt was said by whom and when? If the statement is copyright, then we must reliably make sure that the speaker really pronounced/wrote/posted it into public access, and also make sure that when spreading the statement was not changed or torn from the context. If necessary, we contact the author of the statement to clarify.
- Does the statement of reality correspond? We study the most relevant in the public domain and methodologically consistent data on the subject of statements to draw a preliminary conclusion about its reliability. If necessary, we seek expertise to specialists in the field to which the statement belongs.
- Checking the accuracy of verdict and verification transparency for the reader. Before publication, each text undergoes a second reading, which involves verification of the conformity of the verified approval by the selection criteria, the reconciliation of sources, the availability of sources for the reader, the compliance of the verdict with the logic of verification and our Reliability rating. The second reading occurs at the editing stage. After completing the editor, the author once again checks the data and accuracy of the verdict, and the text goes to the proof. If the author of the audit is one of the editors of the project, its text is checked by another editor.
- “Verified. Media” guarantees that during the second reading, the text is also being checked for the presence of biased, non-nenetral or other statements expressing support by the author of any political party, candidate, ideas or public movement.
- “Verified. Media” uses at least two sources to confirm the main approval of the audit, with the exception of cases when the statement has only one source. For evidence, we strive to use exclusively the primary sources of data, in all cases when there are suitable primary sources. If the suitable primary sources are unavailable or access to them has a limited number of users, we explain the reason for the use of a secondary source and select for evidence those sources to which any user can gain unhindered access.
Quality control. After the publication, we continue to monitor information about the verification subject, in the event of more relevant data sources, the verification may be supplemented in accordance with the rules for making corrections and additions. We also support Feedback With readers and in case of disputed situations, the editors are ready to consider counterarguments and the possibility of creating an expert working group for rechecking the verdict.
