10 tips to detect fake news on Instagram and TikTok

GironaNovember 9, 2024. Argentina. Christian Martin, European correspondent for La Nación+ (LN+), reporting from the United Kingdom, talks about the floods of Cadaqués with a false image. Instead of showing on-screen photos of cars crammed into the riverbank, the Argentine news program depicts the downpours with the Onyar River, at the height of Girona's iconic colorful houses, filled with cars swept away by the force of the river. What Argentines perceived as just another piece of news, for Girona residents—when the video spread on social media—was a demonstration of the extent to which images generated by artificial intelligence can alter our perception of reality and generate misinformation.

In this case, the Girona Adolescent Council, together with ARA, Girona City Council, and UNICEF, launched a participatory workshop on the right to information and fake news. But what we quickly realized was that the Argentine television video hadn't reached us through social media, but rather through social networks. WhatsApp, Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube have become the new generations' habitual ways of consuming information. According to data from the Center for Opinion Studies (CEO), 83% of young people between the ages of 18 and 34 get their information through social networks.

The portrait painted by a study of the Mediterranean Journal of Communication It goes further: there is a growing interest in information among the young people surveyed between 15 and 24 years old, but they do not obtain it through traditional media, but rather through social networks. Instagram and WhatsApp are the most used (90% of those surveyed), followed by TikTok (80%), which has seen strong growth in terms of information consumption.

For years, young people have been trained to discriminate against rumors, misinformation, and fake news, but the examples are usually information that appears in traditional media. Therefore, as adolescents between 10 and 12 years old who are starting to use mobile phones, they have taken on the challenge of giving 10 tips on how to detect them on social networks, which is where they usually get their information.

Before sharing any video, it's best to check the comments, as it helps you compare the information with what other people know. For example, if someone posts a video saying that Girona is being destroyed and you look at the comments, people on the other side of the world might believe it's true because they don't know the city, but a Girona resident might make it clear that it's a lie.

Don't share the news if you're not sure it's real, because this is what fuels these fake sources. We want to give you an example of how sharing false information affects you. In TikTok videos, they often say we're sharing it with friends because it gets the person in question more views and, in turn, more money. But if we're not sure that the information is true, we're spreading rumors, falsehoods, or misinformation.

Does the story have an alarming title? Or is it too far-fetched or exaggerated? Is it hard to believe? Does it even have a surreal quality? In these cases, use common sense. Use your critical eye. Even more so if it's a very subjective video or has a very emotional tone. Journalists talk about clickbait When it comes to a headline designed to get clicks and gain views. And most of the time, it doesn't offer the information promised or doesn't justify it properly. Impact generates audiences, but not always adequate and truthful information.

A classic that never fails, although artificial intelligence is making it increasingly rare. Is the punctuation correct? Are there spelling, grammatical, or syntax errors? If there are, be suspicious. It could be information compiled too quickly to generate an audience, or it could contain disjointed information taken from different sources or poorly translated.

If the images are of poor quality, with short videos and audios, it can give us clues that it is a deepfake Generated with artificial intelligence. That is, a video is being created with altered faces and voices of its subjects to prove a piece of information. This is the extreme of fake news, but we can also find that a piece of information lacks an image to corroborate what is being said, or that the images or videos are out of context or do not correspond to what the speaker or the text says, in order to achieve another informative purpose.

Journalists always ask themselves a question when reading a piece of news that catches their attention: Who's saying this? Where does the news come from? The key to any piece of news is knowing the source and, once known, being able to verify it. If a video doesn't quite add up, we can search on search engines to see if the information it mentions, especially regarding immigration issues, has been published by an official agency or a mainstream media outlet. If we can't find that information or source, it's highly likely to be fake news.

Look at the way the news is written and consider whether a human could have written it in a similar way. Unfortunately, it's becoming increasingly difficult to discover. But what often happens with artificial intelligence is that the sources aren't cited. Furthermore, the most serious aspect of artificial intelligence is the alteration of images or videos, as well as the voice in audio recordings. If the person narrating the video is also an AI tool, that's another reason to quarantine the information.

Watching five seconds of a video isn't the same as watching the entire video. The beginning of an explanation can be very compelling, but the arguments can fall flat later. It's vital to understand whether information is false or not by reading the entire story and analyzing its context. We often focus only on the headlines or the first few seconds of a video. reel On Instagram, for example, they're designed to engage, build an audience, and create a following. But they may lose quality later.

It's one thing to compare the sources of information, and another to verify the reliability of the source. Traditionally, we would judge whether the media outlet in question is reliable and trustworthy. But in this era, when many influencers have moved on to reporting, it's not always easy to separate the wheat from the chaff. If a communicator shares information that's particularly striking and doesn't add up, check through search engines to see if you're featured in other, more well-known media outlets. Try, whenever possible, to verify and compare it. If it's not correct: report it or leave it in the comments so that false information doesn't spread.

To prevent fake news It is better to look for information from reliable sources, such as the spaces that have proliferated in recent years, which are dedicated to doing what is called fact-checking: Check that the information provided is real. This is the case with Verificado in Catalan, and Maldita.es and Newtral in Spanish, among others.

*15 students from 8 Girona schools, in their first and second years of compulsory secondary education, participated in the development of this guide during the 2024-2025 academic year:

• Zainoune Abdine, Jaume Vicens Vives
• Cristina Arbusé Cabezas, Marists of Gerona
• Laila Badi, Santiago Sobrequés and Vidal
• Valentina Borrell, Ermesenda
• Paloma Duque Serna, Jaume Vicens Vives
• Ingrid Escobar, Montilivi
• Txell Escobar Ayats, Santiago Sobrequés and Vidal
• Martí Gallardo, Vedruna Gerona
• Ona Juan Roig, Carlos Rahola
• Arij Mesly, Ermesenda (Can Prunell)
• Kira Nadal Martínez, Jaume Vicens Vives
• Gabriel Pérez, Santiago Sobrequés and Vidal
• Lucia Ruta, Montilivi
• Lidia Silvas Palomo, FEDAC San Narciso
• Guillem Vidal, Santiago Sobrequés and Vidal