Ana Pastor claims the importance of fighting fake news, in a course of Els Juliols

Journalist Ana Pastor opened the course L’origen del fact-checking a Espanya (Origins of fact-checking in Spain) with a general introduction on fact checking.
Journalist Ana Pastor opened the course L’origen del fact-checking a Espanya (Origins of fact-checking in Spain) with a general introduction on fact checking.
Academic
(19/07/2019)

In printed press, or through social networks, television, radio, we receive hundreds of news which are not always what they seem. These are fake news, lies or half-truth that can go viral in order to generate opinion for or against specific interests. Journalist is still the most important tool to detect these lies and Ana Pastor is working on it in Newtral, a start-up she leads and which is formed by professionals from several fields (journalists, researchers, documentalists, engineers, etc.) in order to look after truthful information. Pastor opened the course from Els Juliols “Lʼorigen del fact-checking a Espanya”, yesterday at the University of Barcelona, with a general introduction on fact-checking -which is common in countries like the US but not known in Spain- and told us how, when and why she created the platform Newtral

Journalist Ana Pastor opened the course L’origen del fact-checking a Espanya (Origins of fact-checking in Spain) with a general introduction on fact checking.
Journalist Ana Pastor opened the course L’origen del fact-checking a Espanya (Origins of fact-checking in Spain) with a general introduction on fact checking.
Academic
19/07/2019

In printed press, or through social networks, television, radio, we receive hundreds of news which are not always what they seem. These are fake news, lies or half-truth that can go viral in order to generate opinion for or against specific interests. Journalist is still the most important tool to detect these lies and Ana Pastor is working on it in Newtral, a start-up she leads and which is formed by professionals from several fields (journalists, researchers, documentalists, engineers, etc.) in order to look after truthful information. Pastor opened the course from Els Juliols “Lʼorigen del fact-checking a Espanya”, yesterday at the University of Barcelona, with a general introduction on fact-checking -which is common in countries like the US but not known in Spain- and told us how, when and why she created the platform Newtral

“I am obsessed with the truth, and in order to find it, you have to combine data journalism with research journalism. I am one of those people who think itʼs better not to believe the first version youʼre told”, noted Pastor in front of a room full of students willing to know how to fight and reveal lies and avoid being lied to.

“During a trip to the United States, I saw that all the media worked on fact-checking -which has been common for years- and I thought we should do it in Spain”, said Pastor. “In 2013, the program El objetivo was born, and in 2018 we created Newtral, trying to chase the truth and be where people are. If people get information from the television, we have to work on TV programs, if they search for information on Twitter, we have to be in social networks. If they prefer to play, we have to offer gamification, and if people went back to sending letters, we would send them too”, noted Pastor.

In order to reach everyone, Newtral offers, for example, a fact-checking service through social networks on relevant current events, such as a session in the Congress of Deputies. It also signed an agreement with Facebook, in order to enter the platform, see the most viral content and warn about that content being fake, according to Newtral. Also, aware of Whatsapp and how it reaches people, it answers any citizenʼs doubt to check information, even if these are current issues: “from the typical lie that says drinking cold water in summer is not good, to the polemic issue on vaccines or flat-earth theories”, said Pastor.

Pastor commented that, despite the daily pressure, “lies are unacceptable regardless of who tells them, and I think that, if you like a politician, you should be more demanding with him/her”, and expressed some hope regarding the future: “There is an evolution, we canʼt surrender. Politicians are starting to see the importance of telling the truth and sometimes, some of them correct themselves. Itʼs not easy for them but they do it”.

Willing to expand this obsession for data in all fields, Newtral is launching new projects. One of these is Newtral Educación and responds to the will of creating knoeledge and talent in this field among the future professionals of communication: “We detected that students are not taught according to fact-checking, and this is why we teach courses like this one. However, we saw we should promote critical thinking before, and we have a couple of projects to be launched at schools and promote critical thinking among the children”, highlighted Pastor.

After Pastor, other members of Newtral took part in the lecture: Lorena Baeza gave some practical examples of verification to show how lies are detected. Also, the head of engineering in Newtral, Rubén Mínguez, showed some tools to detect fake news. And Marilín Gonzalo, coordinator of the digital area of the platform, focused on the new formats for fact checking. Last, the journalist and head of the portal Newtral Transparentia, Inés Calderón, closed the course highlighting the importance of transparency in the obtention of public data such as the politiciansʼ income.