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Microsoft Edge now introduced a built-in fake news detector LoyicaBlog

Have you ever reached a point to check whether the news you are reading is fake or real?

We all are aware with the fact that there are millions of social

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Author
Loyica Team
Feb 21 2019
Microsoft Edge now introduced a built-in fake news detector

Have you ever reached a point to check whether the news you are reading is fake or real?

We all are aware with the fact that there are millions of social media users all around the world. With its vast reach, people are turning to it for news. Not every news that circulates on the social media are true though. There has been millions of fake news coming across our social media pages which leaves the users with a question whether to believe it or not.

There haven’t been any reliable measures taken to stop the circulation of fake news and online misinformation. It is as rampant as ever even if measures to counter these are being put into place. This problem is a tricky one to cater as it requires the readers like us to draw our attention towards the details of the article and its origins. However, the fake news dilemma won’t be solving itself any time soon.

Reports have been telling us that Microsoft mobile Edge browser is taking this problem seriously and has begun to take initiatives regarding it. Microsoft Edge application is compatible with iOS and Android. At present the app has a built-in fake news detector called “NewsGuard”

Microsoft’s Defending Democracy program and NewsGuard for Edge created a partnership to work together in order to eliminate the propagation of fake news.

NewsGuard is not enabled by default. Microsoft Edge users can enable it with a simple toggle in their settings menu. When you first download the app to test it, Microsoft Edge will guide you towards the menu and there will be an option called New Rating which will activate NewsGuard with a small blue dot for the users.

The NewsGuard’s ratings concentrate on US based websites for now but major sites of other countries can also benefit from it. NewsGuard’s rating are impressive but they still somehow exemplify the issue of fighting fake news and this task is tricky. Fake news can be circulated through any kind of medium and tracing the source of fake news online can be similar to looking for a needle in a haystack.

NewsGuard relies on a human team instead of any algorithms and it undergoes a series of discussion and researches to detect whether the news is fake or not. Microsoft Edge as a browser is not as popular as its competitors but it still creates an interesting case study in the war against low-quality information circulating online.

The fake news circulation cannot be resolved in just a couple of days, weeks or months. However, this issue can be sorted out by installing a news verification tool right into the browser you are using. This might be the first step towards eliminating the issue gradually.

Microsoft Edge and NewsGuard together have taken a step towards solving this problem to a certain degree and in the near future hopefully there will be a decrease in the circulation of fake news on online platforms.

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