07/22/2021

NewsGuard to participate in the Italian Digital Media Observatory, a newly formed consortium selected by the European Commission to fight disinformation in Italy

(July 22, 2021 — New York) NewsGuard Technologies, which deploys trained journalists to review and rate the credibility of thousands of news and information websites, today announced its participation in the creation of the Italian Digital Media Observatory (IDMO).

IDMO is one of eight hubs awarded funding from the European Commission to help fight disinformation and fake news at European level.

NewsGuard joins the consortium alongside seven other members including renowned universities Luiss University and the University of Rome Tor Vergata, national public broadcaster RAI, fact-checking organization Pagella Politica, research and consulting company T6 Ecosystems, and other major media and telco operators such as TELECOM and GEDI.

NewsGuard will aid the efforts of the consortium, led by Luiss University, by providing its data on misinformation websites to detect, analyze and disclose harmful disinformation campaigns at national, multinational and EU level, and to analyze their impact on society and democracy. IDMO will also provide media literacy activities at the national level and will cooperate with national authorities for the monitoring of online platforms’ policies and digital media ecosystem. 

“We are proud to be included in this group alongside such important players that are known internationally for their work and expertise in the field,” said Virginia Padovese, Managing Editor & Vice President Partnerships, Europe at NewsGuard. “We look forward to working with our partners to fight misinformation and disinformation at a national level, having gained the trust of the European Commission on such a delicate and important matter.”

“As misinformation poses an increasing threat to democracies worldwide, it is encouraging to see government bodies like the European Commission take action to counter these harms,” said Gordon Crovitz, NewsGuard co-CEO. “We are honored to play a role in fighting disinformation at this scale and welcome future opportunities to aid governments worldwide in their efforts to counter misinformation and hoaxes.”

 

About NewsGuard

Launched in March 2018 by media entrepreneur and award-winning journalist Steven Brill and former Wall Street Journal publisher Gordon Crovitz, NewsGuard provides credibility ratings and detailed “Nutrition Labels” for thousands of news and information websites. NewsGuard rates all the news and information websites that account for 95% of online engagement across the U.S., U.K., Germany, France, and Italy. NewsGuard products include NewsGuard, HealthGuard, and BrandGuard, which helps marketers concerned about their brand safety, and the Misinformation Fingerprints catalog of top hoaxes.

NewsGuard rates each site based on nine apolitical criteria of journalistic practice, including whether a site repeatedly publishes false content, whether it regularly corrects or clarifies errors, and whether it avoids deceptive headlines. It awards weighted points for each criterion and sums them up; a score of less than 60 earns a “Red” rating, while 60 and above earns a “Green” rating, which indicates it is generally reliable.

NewsGuard’s ratings and Nutrition Labels can be licensed by internet service providers, browsers, news aggregators, education companies, and social media and search platforms in order to make NewsGuard’s information about news websites available to their users. Consumers can access these ratings by purchasing a subscription to NewsGuard, which costs $2.95/month and includes access to NewsGuard’s browser extension for Chrome, Safari, and Firefox and its mobile app for iOS and Android. The extension is available for free on Microsoft’s Edge browser through a license agreement with Microsoft, and NewsGuard’s ratings can also be accessed free through the Edge mobile browser. Hundreds of public libraries globally receive free access to use NewsGuard’s browser extension on their public-access computers to give their patrons more context for the news they encounter online. For more information, including to download the browser extension and review the ratings process, visit newsguardtech.com.

NewsGuard Contacts

  • Steven Brill, Co-CEO, steven.brill@newsguardtech.com, +1 212-332-6301
  • Gordon Crovitz, Co-CEO, gordon.crovitz@newsguardtech.com, +1 212-332-6407
  • Virginia Padovese, Managing Editor & Vice President Partnerships, Europe, virginia.padovese@newsguardtech.com, +39 347 8634920