Because we are trained journalists who have spent our careers dedicated to the profession. We care deeply about reliable journalism’s pivotal role in democracy. (In case you’re wondering, our experienced journalists come from diverse backgrounds and have no political axes to grind.)
Because you can see the credentials and backgrounds of everyone responsible for every NewsGuard reliability rating and Nutrition Label that you read. For the names and biographies of our staff and contributors, click here.
Because we have an ethics and conflicts of interest policy to which all of our analysts and editors have to agree. You can read that policy here.
Because we are totally transparent about how we make all of our decisions. Our Nutrition Label write-ups explain what is behind our decisions. We disclose and explain in detail the nine criteria we use to rate each news site on its journalistic practices. We’re not a black box algorithm.
Because we make concerted attempts to get comment from every website’s editor or manager before we write anything negative about the site, and always include the comment in our Nutrition Labels (or make changes after weighing the comment and realizing our initial conclusion was wrong). Algorithms don’t call for comment.
Because we will post any complaints from website proprietors about anything we have written about them. And we will answer them publicly – and when warranted will make corrections, publicly, after we consider the complaint. You can read our policy for correcting errors or mistakes here.
Because we accept no fees from the news websites we rate. (Our revenue comes from the platforms and search engines for licensing our ratings in order to include them in their feeds and search results.) We rate all news and information sites among the more than 7,500 sites responsible for 95% of engagement with news in the U.S., U.K., Canada, France, Germany and Italy.
Because bringing more information to people about the news sources they encounter online is our only business. Our success depends entirely on being trustworthy and reliable.