Green: A website is rated Green if it generally adheres to basic standards of credibility and transparency. (If the site adheres to all nine of our criteria, we note that in the rating. If it has significant exceptions among the criteria, we note that, too.)
Red: A website is rated Red if it generally fails to meet basic standards of credibility and transparency. (We note whether the site failed several of our nine criteria, or whether it severely violates journalistic standards by failing an especially significant number of criteria.)
Satire: A humor or satire site receives a satire rating, indicating that while it may use news as a basis for satire, it is not a traditional news website. We do not rate these sites according to the nine journalistic criteria, but we do provide a description of each site including, if possible, who is behind it.
Platform: A site receives a platform rating if it primarily hosts content directly published by users with limited vetting. Information from platform sites may or may not be reliable. We do not rate these sites according to the nine journalistic criteria, but we do provide a description of each site and its practices.
It is important to note that the only attribute that sites rated Green have in common is that they did not fail to meet enough of the 9 criteria that they should be rated Red. Not all sites rated Green are equal. We note in each rating whether the site meets all of our criteria or whether there were some significant exceptions.