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Emerging	Journalistic	Verification	Practices
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Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
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Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media
by Brandtzæg, P.B., Lüders, M., Spangenberg, J., Rath-Wiggins, L., & Følstad, A.
Abstract
The verification of social media content and sources are increasingly critical to journalists and
news organisations. In this study we report on findings from qualitative interviews conducted
with 24 journalists working with social media in major news organizations in Europe. Our
findings contribute to new knowledge on journalists' social media working practices. We find
that social media content often are used as the primary news source, and journalists use
several different verification strategies to verify social media content and sources. Journalists
are also found to have various competences in verifying social media content, in particular
visual content. Moreover, our study suggests user requirements for future innovations in tools
to support the verification of social media content. To avoid trade-offs between verification
and fast-paced publishing, journalists will need efficient and easy-to-use support both in the
verification process and in structuring and organising an overwhelming amount of social
media content.
Key words: social media, verification, journalism, user requirements
“This is an Author’s Accepted Manuscript of an article published in [include the complete
citation information for the final version of the article as published in the [JOURNALISM
PRACTICE] [online 13.03.2015] [copyright Taylor & Francis], available online at:
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17512786.2015.1020331?journalCode=rjop20#.V
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Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
2
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media –
Traditional journalism practices are changing due to the disruption in information and
communication patterns caused by social media (e.g. YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc.), that
is, a group of Internet-based applications "that allow for the creation and exchange of user
generated content"(Kaplan & Haenlein, 2010, p. 61). Journalists increasingly turn to social
media (Knight & Cook, 2013), especially for researching topics, curating information and
analysing stories (Hermida, 2012). Furthermore, journalists use social media to share their
experiences, their thoughts and opinions, and to engage in dialogue with their readers
(Spangenberg & Heise, 2014). Social media may also be used for online identification of
sources and for interviewing eyewitnesses (Wardle, 2014).
Journalistic norms and ideals, such as impartiality, objectivity and accuracy (Golding
& Elliott, 1979; Shapiro, et al., 2013), highlight the need for effective verification of social
media sources and content (Schifferes & Newman, 2013). The credibility and trustworthiness
of news organisations, which in part depends on adequate verification practices (Knight &
Cook, 2013; Silverman, 2014), cannot be taken for granted. Over the past two decades, the
public’s overall trust in the press has declined (Project for Excellence in Journalism, 2006);
some even consider journalists among the least credible professionals in the world (Hanitzsch,
2013). It is therefore of importance to keep journalistic standards high and to take into
consideration new strategies of how to verify content, esp. in regards to social media content.
Verification of social media sources and content is challenging. It is often difficult to
determine the truth, accuracy, or validity, both of sources providing textual content and
content presented through other modalities (video, images, or audio). In situations of
controversy, social media may be particularly prone to being used for propaganda and the
spread of disinformation. The Social Media Today report suggests that 49 percent of people in
the US have heard breaking news via social media that turned out to be false (Morejon, 2012).
During the Arab Spring in 2011, for example, several actors flooded Twitter and YouTube
with false information (Swedish Radio, 2013). There have also been a number of welldocumented
cases in which manipulated photos and untrue stories, spread via social media,
have been picked up and distributed by news agencies (Schifferes & Newman, 2013). Thus,
this paper explores journalists' experiences and their emerging working and verification
practices concerning social media.
Verification is important in all journalism, but what makes verification practices
concerning social media different? Social media are characterized by user generated content;
such content can be changed, manipulated or removed out of context from the original. The
amount of potentially false or manipulated user generated content makes it harder to filter and
assess the accuracy of the different content and sources. Successful verification of social
media content and sources, therefore results from effective use and knowledge about new
technology, as well as from commitment to timeless standards of accuracy (Buttry, 2014, p.
16). Hence, the characteristics related to social media, might change the journalists' strategies
towards verification, relying more on technology, and knowledge about social media effects.
Furthermore, the acceleration of the news cycle and proliferation of news and information
within social media has raised concerns about the erosion of the discipline of verification
among journalists (Hermida, 2012). It is argued that ‘if speed is the currency of the modern
information era, misinformation is the increasingly high cost’ (Wood, 2013). According to
Hylland Eriksen (2001), limitless access to information might lead to confusion rather than
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
3
enlightenment, and a ‘tyranny of the moment’, which is also relevant for journalists who are
expected to disseminate news nearly in real-time. The fast-paced 24/7 news cycle in
combination with social media requires journalists to make swift decisions about whether
information is sufficiently verified (Buttry, 2014).
At present, there are multiple online tools, such as SocialMention, Storyful, Politifact,
Fastfact, Topsy, Sulia, TinEye, FotoForensics, and Trackur, to name but a few that journalists
may apply for social media research and verification. However, the extent to which journalists
actually use such tools is unknown, and no commonly shared practices exist. At present, there
is also no single tool to track and verify all social media sources (Schifferes & Newman,
2013), satisfying the totality of journalistic verification needs.
The verification process in social media is arguably rather complex, due to large
amounts of user generated content, real time information flow and various forms of sources
and content modalities, such as video and images. Many news organisations have published
guidelines that outline how content from social media should be handled. In some news
organisations, specialised journalists have particular roles, such as social media “journalists”
or “social media editors”. In other models, groups of people deal with social media organised
around social media desks, as is the case with the BBC’s User Generated Content and Social
Media Hub (Turner, 2012; Schifferes & Newman, 2013).
Globally, not all journalists use social media as a news source. According to the
Global Digital Journalism Study (2013), only 51 per cent of journalists worldwide use social
media. The situation in Europe and the U.S. is different: there, the vast majority of journalists
use social media. For example, 96 per cent of UK journalists turn to social media every day.
The same study also found that journalists' reliance on social media content is very low if the
sources are not known to the respective journalists dealing with a specific topic, and 42 per
cent of journalists use trusted third parties to verify stories; the most important source for
validation in social media seeming to be industry insiders or other news organisations, such as
AP, Reuters and the BBC (Global Digital Journalism Study, 2013). While some recent studies
focus on journalists and their verification practices in general (Shapiro, et al., 2013), few
studies explore current journalistic working practices and needs concerning the verification of
social media as a news source in particular.
Against this background, new tools and knowledge are needed to help journalists and
news organisations benefit from the opportunities offered by social media, as well as help
them understand and mitigate key challenges related to such use (Diakopoulos, et al., 2012).
Challenges may be practical; for example, a great deal of time can be spent sifting through
massive data sources that might be inaccurate and misleading. At the same time, precise
judgment of the reliability of social media content is critical for the accuracy of the news story
being presented. To develop such tools, we need insights into the social media verification
process from the perspective of journalists with first-hand experience using social media as
part of their news production practices.
In this paper, we report on a study of journalists' experiences and emerging practices
involving social media as a news source. Furthermore, our user-centred approach is suitable to
support user requirements engineering (Kauppinen, Savolainen, & Mannisto, 2007). We use
our findings to identify and analyse journalists' working practices and user requirements for
future work support in social media verification.
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
4
Definitions and theoretical considerations
In this study, a journalist is defined as a person who is professionally engaged in
journalism and working for a news organisation or contributing to a news organisations’
output. Journalism is linked to an institutional framework and a social contract geared towards
public interest and verification of knowledge (Hanitzsch, 2007; 2013).
Verification, in turn, is understood as a process that is a critical part of the
newsgathering and information dissemination process. Verification requires skilled
determination of the accuracy or validity of both the source and the content itself. Hence,
there are two key elements that need to be verified: the source of a piece of content, and the
content itself. These two elements should be independently verified, and compared against
each other, to see if they tell a consistent story (Posetti, 2014). A verification process may rely
on online tools as well as traditional journalistic techniques. It is argued that no technology
can automatically verify social media content with 100 per cent accuracy (Wardle, 2014). Fact
and truth in general are difficult topics to deal with as they are always linked to interpretations
and subjective aspects (Hanitzsch, 2007). Brennen (2009, p. 301) suggests that ‘facts are
messy, difficult to determine and they are often dependent on interpretation’. According to
Wardle (2014, p. 26) there are four main elements in verifying social media content:
provenance (is this the original piece of content?), source (who uploaded the content?), date
(when was the content created?), and location (where was the content created?). However,
journalists arguably lack some standard rules or unified method in how to verify information
and sources (Shapiro et al., 2013).
To better understand journalism practices and the verification of social media content,
we use Hanitzsch’s (2007) theoretical framework of ‘journalism culture’, referring to the
values, attitudes, beliefs, practices and artefacts (cultural products, tools and texts) that are
present in the work of news professionals. The current study uses this approach to investigate
different journalistic practices and beliefs adopted in the process of verifying social media
content. Hence, our focus is on the ‘culture of news production’, focusing on contextual
factors that shape practices of journalism and the construction of news (Steensen and Ahva,
2015), with a focus on verification strategies. Following Hanitzsch (2007), we explore
journalistic attitudes and beliefs towards verification in the news production process and,
more specifically, investigate how different artefacts (tools and platforms) in social media are
used in and how they are shaping the journalistic practice. The journalists’ personal (and not
the institutional) roles and needs are therefore central to this study and refer to the ways
journalists perceive and experience their daily work and their current and future needs for
delivering trustworthy news content to their audiences.
Research question
To reveal emerging journalistic values, practices, challenges and needs concerning the
verification of social media content and sources, the following research question was
explicated:
What characterizes emerging journalistic values, needs and practices concerning the
verification process of social media content and sources?
The answers to this question will generate the knowledge required to better understand
how journalists manage information gathering and verification in social media. Such
knowledge will form the basis for the development of innovative tools to support journalists’
social media work and verification practices.
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
5
Method
To answer our research question, we chose a user-centred approach. Since not all
journalists are equally engaged in social media for professional use (Hedman & Djerf-Pierre,
2013), we targeted only journalists that already had experience with social media in
journalism and investigated their experiences and perspectives. This methodological choice
was motivated by our assumption that insight in emerging practices concerning verification in
social media required the respondents to hold substantial practical experience.
Interviews
We conducted 24 semi-structured interviews with journalists between January and
February 2014. To increase the breadth of the data collection, the interviewees were based in
different European countries: Germany (14), Norway (7), France (1), Denmark (1), and the
UK (1). The sample included 18 men and 6 women. Two interviewees were between the ages
of 21 and 30 years, 11 were between the ages of 31 and 40 years, and 11 were between the
ages of 41 and 50 years. Seventeen interviewees were news journalists, while seven were
programme editors or responsible for social media activities of various kinds. Most of the
interviewees had extensive experience in news production practices. All used social media
almost daily or continuously throughout the day. All the interviews were conducted as part of
the research project Reveal (http://revealproject.eu/). All participants used Twitter, and all
except three used Facebook. More details on the sample are provided in Tables A1 and A2 of
the Appendix.
The seven journalists from Norway (Table A1) were recruited from four major news
organizations in Oslo. Each news organisation was contacted by sending emails to their news
editor, asking them to appoint their most relevant news journalists with regard to social media
experiences for face-to-face, semi-structured interviews.
The other journalists were recruited through the networks of the involved research
team of international media organisation Deutsche Welle (Table A2), which also explains
why German based journalists are overrepresented in the sample. Interviews took place either
face-to-face or via telephone.
The focus of all the interviews was to explore how journalists currently include social
media in their working practices, with a special focus on verification. This included the
following guiding questions:
 How is social media used for professional purposes?
 How do journalists identify contributors and how do they use social media content?
 How do journalists verify social media content (workflows, processes, aids, etc.)?
 Which tools are used for verification (e.g. external tools, internal tools and
customized tools)?
 What obstacles are there to using social media content (in terms of reliability,
difficulties, shortcomings, etc.)?
 What would make social media content verification less difficult for journalists?
As the purpose of the interviews was to explore the participants’ own perceptions,
experiences and opinions, the researchers frequently departed from the interview protocol to
probe for more information and follow up on the participants’ answers. The interviewers also
interpreted the interviewees' reports during the interview (‘on-the-line interpretation’) and
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
6
presented these to the participants for immediate verification (Kvale, 1996). This was done to
strengthen the credibility of the interpretations and analysis.
The interviews with the seven Norwegian journalists lasted 40 to 60 minutes and were
audio- recorded and transcribed. The interviews, conducted by the Deutsche Welle
researchers, with journalists, editors, and social media coordinators, lasted 50 to 70 minutes
but were not recorded due to time constraints. Instead, extensive notes were taken during the
interviews (following the interview guidelines) and subsequently entered into an online form
developed and piloted for this purpose. The translation of all the interview data into English
took place by two of the researchers involved in the interviews.
Analysis
The interview data were analysed to formulate a descriptive base for journalistic
working practices concerning verification of social media sources and content. This base was
then employed for developing user requirements that reflect journalists’ needs concerning
such verification in information gathering through social media.
The interview data were organised and coded according to categories related to
working practices and verification issues, in line with our theoretical approach, focusing on
contextual factors (social media) that shape practices of journalism (Hanitzsch, 2007).The
Norwegian material was coded using the computer software NVivo. The Deutsche Welle
material was organised after a review of the notes by two researchers with the same categories
in mind. User requirements were developed as a User Needs Analysis (Shackel, 1991), which
focused on three main themes: 1) user characteristics, 2) user context and tools, and 3)
obstacles to verification. These main themes had different sub-categories that were developed
based on the analysis.
In total, four researchers were involved in the analysis. They discussed and reviewed
each other’s coding and interpretations throughout the entire process.
Results and discussion
We find that journalists apply several different verification strategies, which is similar to
findings reported by Shapiro and colleagues (2013). In more detail, our analysis revealed that
the social media work and verification practices among journalists could be divided into the
following five main categories:
1. Trusted sources
2. Access to eyewitnesses and authenticating sources
3. Traditional journalistic methods
4. Multimodal verification and verification tools
5. Workaround methods
(1) Trusted sources
The interviewees nearly unanimously reported social media to be a significant source
of potential news stories. This finding emphasises how, to some extent, parts of the news
production process has been reversed due to social media. As described by one journalist:
Before, we often called people, to find out whether anything had happened. Not many
years ago, you took the initiative. But now, the opposite is the case because you often get
information from Twitter or other places. I work a lot with the police and the justice system,
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
7
and it has changed; social media is now the place where you first get access to information.
(...) The foundation for what you produce news stories on is really from social media.
In particular, our participants reported following trusted national and international
news agencies and news providers, such as TV2, NRK, AFP, CBC, Reuters, ABC, the BBC,
as well as celebrities, politicians, and other opinion leaders. Police and fire departments were
also considered important to follow as they disseminate real-time updates about emergency
situations, and importantly for providing accurate and reliable content.
Twitter was the most commonly used social network site among our participants (see
Table A1 and A2). The participants reported monitoring Twitter for breaking news and news
sources, often with the help of tools such as Tame.it or TweetDeck, for organising and
structuring timelines, keeping track of lists, searches, activities and more. This is in line with
previous reports which have found that Twitter is regarded as the most important social media
service for journalists (Holton & Lewis, 2011; The Global Digital Journalism Study, 2013).
The participants also reported using other social media services, such as Facebook, YouTube,
LinkedIn, Google+, Tumblr, blogs, and Instagram. Blog aggregators, such as Rivva, and news
aggregators, such as Newswhip, Google News and Virato, were also mentioned.
The prevalence of Twitter use was reported to be mainly due to its open nature and the
fact that it provides easy access to both breaking news and trusted sources. The latter has been
easier since Twitter started operating with verified accounts, indicated by a blue badge in the
profile. These badges are used to establish authenticity and trust in the identities of key
individuals and brands on Twitter (although manipulations can occur and the ‘verified’ sign is
no guarantee of the accuracy of content or the respective source).
Social media are said to expand the range of actors and sources involved in the
construction of the news (Hermida, Lewis and Zamith, 2014). This notion was supported by
our findings, though authenticating content from non-elite sources is not always straightforward.
Whereas direct access to a broader spectre of sources has improved, journalists claim
they do not uncritically trust content and sources from social media. When potential sources
multiply, verification challenges become more prevalent. To address these challenges, content
from social media is for example corroborated with information and practices from trusted
sources:
If it's from a militant or terrorist group, like if someone from Al-Shabab posts a photo,
then probably BBC or some of the other big media companies have already used it. And if
they have, I consider the content to be reliable.
Such vicarious forms of verification have limitations, and might also explain
inaccurate and false stories going viral. As the below analysis will demonstrate, our
interviewees also point to additional means for verifying content and sources.
(2) Access to eyewitnesses and authenticating sources
Besides Twitter, the journalists in this study also reported frequently using Facebook as an
important news source, for authenticity assessment, for contacting eyewitnesses or for
accessing profiles of people involved in crime cases. As described by one journalist,
opportunities to contact people affected by major news events have improved:
The first time I can remember to have used social media very actively in a big incident
was the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007. I looked at different student profiles (Facebook) at
the school and sent requests to those students who seemed to have been there when it
happened. We had several eyewitnesses, via Facebook. We were directly in touch with
eyewitnesses.
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
8
The journalists describe how social media such as Twitter and Facebook shorten the
distance to breaking news events, and how global news events require special efforts when
assessing news sources, their authenticity, and their role in a conflict, for example.
Journalists have become better at looking beyond their own neighbourhoods. The
distance to a village in Pakistan is shorter than it was five years ago. But now I talk
particularly about breaking news, which is still where the Internet has its main competitive
edge. (...) So we use social media to pick up on news as early as possible. You can set your
own feeds, and AP (Associated Press) is usually very quick. And when something happens, we
fine tune our feeds much closer, and you look at who else from AP follows this person. And if
there are private citizens who get retweeted a lot by people you trust, you put them in the feed
to get closer and closer. The goal is to get so close that you would have accessed the person
who witnessed the raid on bin Laden.
This practice is complicated when those involved have vested interests in a conflict. In
such cases, assessing the authenticity of the source is only part of the task. For example,
during the demonstrations in Kiev/Ukraine in early 2014, an interviewed journalist who was
covering the events stressed the need for knowledge on whether sources were supporting the
opposition or whether they were critical towards the ruling system. Another journalist pointed
towards the importance of assessing whether claims made by the involved actors were
accurate or rather attempts to belittle one side or the other. The tension between the need to
report breaking news as it happens and the need to verify sources and identify their roles in a
conflict is profound. The interviewees describe how they cross-check information with
Google searches, look up Facebook and Twitter accounts, and again consider it strengthening
the trustworthiness of a social media source if, for example, a credible and reputational outlet
such as AP, the New York Times and/or the BBC include the same or similar voices in their
news stories. The journalistic practices of using elite sources are also found in other research
(Hermida, et al., 2014). Reich (2011) suggested that journalists depend almost exclusively on
a particular set of sources that had proved their trustworthiness in the past.
Several of the interviewees also emphasised the need to combine old and new journalistic
methods; they monitor social media to discover whom to contact for further information in
order to evaluate and assess what is found on social media. This often aids in the construction
of news stories.
(3) Traditional journalistic methods
Regular journalistic criteria are still working, right. Like if there is a tweet about a
plane having crashed in Bergen, we don't report it; we call the rescue coordination centre
and the police, right. Social media content is managed the same way as regular news tips that
are called in to us. Everything has to be checked and confirmed.
Journalists need to find the essential data, sources and contacts related to their content
for verification, ideally without time-consuming and difficult search activities to identify
sources, dates and locations. Hence, information gathering and verification of news sources
can also benefit from interactive dialogue with readers in social media (Holton & Lewis,
2011). This is the key to successful verification processes that meet the fast-paced working
requirements of journalists. These needs are in line with Wardle's (2014) four elements
(provenance, source, date and location) for checking and confirming social media content.
However, most of the interviewed journalists use traditional verification methods that are
slow and rigid: looking up contacts and calling them directly. To do this, they reported to
regularly use a multi-contact approach, including email, Google, checking profiles (followers,
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
9
tweets and lists), other social networking sites’ accounts, and platforms such as Namechecker,
Google, LinkedIn, and Xing. They used several different verification strategies, and the
practices differed in regard to different types of social media content and sources, as
illustrated in Table 1.
Table 1. Verification tools and strategies used by social media journalists (N=24)
Content Source
Texts Photos Videos
Google text search,
phrase search in
social media,,
manually contacting
them (e.g. phone).
Google Image
Search, Tin Eye,
Exif, Topsy,
Tungstene
Google Maps,
Streetview, cross
checking YouTube
videos, Storyful
Phone call, e-mail, Google,
checking profiles (followers,
tweets, lists), other social
media accounts?,
Namechecker, Google, Xing
etc, People directories (to get
contact details and check on
contributors) such as peekyou
and pipl
The journalists were found to still prefer face-to-face contact or phone contact when
verifying sources, which is also illustrated in the quote above and Table 1. Another journalist
refers to ‘journalistic common sense’ in this context:
My journalistic common sense. Not so much a tool, but to have a really close look at the
contributor [...] Of course, it would be great to have a tool that assists with all these checks.
Still, journalists expressed a desire for a tool to support them, as they struggle with a
flood of information and increasing time pressures on the job. Support in the initial filtering
and verifying of information, linked with easy contact information to sources came across as
the main point. Relatedly, the interviewees emphasised that a well-crafted news story requires
more than merely re-publishing content from social media:
It definitely does not suffice to just extract something from Facebook or Twitter. You
need to talk to people.
Hence, journalists in our sample rely on traditional journalistic methods to construct
news stories with an added value compared to what anyone could access via social media. In
short, social media do not provide ready-made news stories. As explained by one journalist:
[With social media] you get an unfiltered and uncritical newsfeed. But what we provide is an
edited and controlled stream of news. That's completely different. The challenge for us is to be
able to maintain the required quality on what we report, right?
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
10
The flood of information in social media is also increasingly video- and image-based,
which leads us to multimodal verification.
(4) Multimodal verification and verification tools
The participants in our interviews reported that videos and photos were the most
challenging modalities to verify. For example, on YouTube, the interviewed journalists
reported deploying the following techniques: to check if they can identify the contributor, to
check more in detail who the contributor is, cross-check which other videos the contributor
has previously uploaded, and checking components of the video (e.g. thumbnails). Identifying
the source is often difficult. As with other types of content, many of the journalists reported to
regard it as a type of verification if news organisations they trust have already re-published
photos and videos from social media in their news stories (this, however, does not yet say
anything about the ‘right to publish’). Most interviewees reported that verifying photos and
videos requires particular knowledge about available tools and how they can assist in the
verification process.
At present, a fair number of the journalists whom we talked to do not have the skills and
knowledge to perform an independent and timely assessment of photos and videos posted in
social media. Many are either not familiar with the online tools that currently exist for such
purpose, or have no access to them (e.g. as some of the tools require a commercial license, or
internal restrictions such as network security simply do not allow for the use of third party
tools in respective corporate environments). However, the more advanced social media
journalists reported using Google Image Search, Tin Eye, Exif Viewers, Topsy, and
Tungstene for photo verification. For video verification a combination of tools was reported:
for example, the location in a video could be cross-checked with the street view in Google
maps to see if landscapes match. Also, some of the previously mentioned tools are used, e.g.
checking ofthumbnails (extracts of a video). Additionally, Storyful, a commercial service for
verification of content from social media, was also reported to be used for the verification of
images and videos. Whereas photos and videos are regarded as challenging to verify, the
interviewees also argue that it is particularly important to fact-check them:
With text, you can always include disclaimers. But when you use a photo or video, they
need to be absolutely confirmed. (...) You can always write "unconfirmed sources", this is not
confirmed by any news agencies yet. If you publish a photo of a large explosion, you need to
be sure this is the right place.
This quote points to the final ‘method’ journalists rely on when they have not been
able or have not had the time to verify newsworthy content—they make a disclaimer in the
published news story.
(5) Workaround methods
Our findings presented so far might suggest that the interviewed journalists always, in
some way or another, verify information from social media before including it in a news
story. However, with the pressure to publish stories from events as they unfold, verification is
not always regarded as feasible. A distinction needs to be made between investigative
journalism on the one hand and covering breaking news on the other. As lamented by one
journalist:
I think it's important to discuss these issues according to type of news stories. When I
have responsibility to follow breaking news, I'll try to monitor different sources, you follow up
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
11
certain messages (...) and then things can pick up really quickly. But with verifying, like with
today's online journalism, what kind of verification is actually being done?
Hence, the experiences of the interviewees are largely in line with Hermida’s (2010, p.
300) claim that ‘journalism norms are bending as professional practices adapt to social media
tools’. Yet, norms are not collapsing, and the interviewees emphasised the importance of
being transparent about the status of claims and information. They bring with them previous
journalistic practices, explaining that when information cannot be verified, they instead
include disclaimers such as ‘according to unverified sources’ or similar phrases.
But we take reservations. For example, we write that they supposedly claimed this and
that, or that it is supposedly the account of the Kyiv Post. You can always include disclaimers.
We do that often.
Such workarounds are easily identified in published news stories, yet whether
journalists are always transparent about the status of unverified sources is more appropriately
studied using content analysis. However, given the status of credibility and trustworthiness as
central assets in journalism and to counter the decline in the public’s trust in journalism,
journalists need to report accurately, also when sources come from social media. When
sources cannot be verified, or when conflicts are ridden by conflicting messages, disclaimers
might be the easiest way out:
At least it's better than pretending you have verified something. You have to be honest.
And similarly, we often use "conflicting reports". Because there's a lot more insecurity now
than before, since there are so many different messages being reported. Thus, we include that
often, there are conflicting reports about what has happened.
User group characteristics, contexts and requirements for future verification support
So far, we have identified five main practices for the verification of social media
content and sources. Social media are now integrated into the working lives of most of the
journalists we talked to, but the verifications strategies among them vary (see also Shapiro et
al., 2013). Hence, not all the journalists in our sample engaged in all practices, and many
combine different strategies. There may, however, be large differences in in various news
organizations and between journalists concerning whether and how they use social media as a
news-source and how they verify content and sources. Our next step in the analysis is to use
our data on user group characteristics and contexts to identify requirements for future tools to
support journalists' in their social media verification practices.
Understanding user group characteristics and their working context is critical to
develop work support that actually serves its purpose. Furthermore, the transformations
currently occurring in the nature of social media practices and verification among journalists
cannot be properly understood without considering journalists’ characteristics as a social
media user group, as well as their context of work and journalism culture (Orlikowski &
Barley, 2001).
In the following sections we summarise general characteristics of journalists as users
of social media and future social media verification tools, as well as their context of use. On
the basis of these summarizations we suggest user requirements for future innovations
(Kauppinen, et al., 2007) supporting the verification of social media content and sources. First
we summarize findings and requirements concerning user group characteristics in Table 2.
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
12
Table 2. User group characteristics and related user requirements
Characteristics Potential user requirements Ref. quotes
Experience with verification tools:
Experience with verification tools differs
among journalists. Many journalists do
this manually using e.g. the Google
toolset, which can be a time-consuming
and difficult process. Tools that are
known to some journalists are Storyful
and TinyEye, to name a few.
Efficient way to verify social
media content. Knowledge
of available tools and the
possibilities they offer. Build
customised solutions or add-
ons.
‘Social media content is managed
the same way as regular news tips
that are reported to us. Everything
has to be checked and confirmed’.
Social media experience: The
journalists reported to use social media,
mainly Twitter, frequently. Yet, most
journalists are not tech savvy. Usability
and accessibility is important.
Easy-to-use tool that is
integrated with tools
journalists are already using
(e.g. Twitter)
‘Most journalists are not really
technical experts’.
See Tables A1 and A2 describing
the tools the journalists are using.
Most use Twitter.
Knowledge of verification: Knowledge
of verification is or should be part of a
journalist’s education. Yet, fast-paced
journalism and tight deadlines put
verification under pressure and require
new skillsets, tools and workflows.
Easy and efficient to use to
support high-speed
publication processes
‘The most important thing is to
produce results as quickly as
possible, and to hope for the best.
For breaking news that is’.
Motivation to use additional (thirdparty)
tools: Many journalists are
motivated to use additional tools for
verification if this improves their
performance.
Tools that are relevant aid in
the verification process.
Provide journalists with
direct contact to information
sources.
‘Of course, it would be great to
have a tool that assists with all
these checks.’
‘I‘d really like some easy way to
contact people/profiles for
verification’.
Likely concerns: They were not sure if
they could rely on algorithms for the
purpose of verification.
A clear understanding of
how the verification is
taking place (what is behind
the algorithm).
Humanization of the tool.
‘Such as Klout, but where the
algorithm is clear to me’.
In Table 3 we report findings and requirements concerning the context of use. The journalists
in our sample were typically ‘always on’, mainly via PC or smartphones. Many of them used
TweetDeck to organise and structure content and feeds from Twitter. They typically reported
to work in an increasingly fast-paced, multi-media environment with a constant demand for
fast and efficient publishing of content. This is taking place in an increasingly market-driven
context, in which the number of clicks and the number of likes and re-tweets play a growing
role, but so are factors such as trust and reliability. This kind of market-driven journalism has
also been identified in other studies (Lee & Lewis, 2012). It is of course a good thought to
give journalists better guidance, practice and tools on verification, but in the culture of today's
high-pressure newsrooms with diminished resources and constant deadlines, guidelines of
accuracy may not be enough. A key challenge is finding an easy and efficient as well as a
reliable way for journalists to verify social media data (e.g. a verification tool), which can be
well incorporated in their ongoing working practices and culture.
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
13
Table 3. The user context and related user requirements
Characteristics Potential user requirements Ref. quotes
Devices: The journalists reported
using social media on both PCs
and smartphones.
Access to the tool from multiple
devices: desktop and mobile
‘I use my mobile phone and PC
continuously to keep myself
updated’.
Software: All the journalists
reported using apps and browsers.
Several use TweetDeck to organise
Twitter content and sources.
Make sense of a huge amount of
content and quickly identify
relevant and important sources and
news.
‘We are not actually exploiting the
full potential from social media
(...) the biggest challenge is to keep
track and identify potentially
interesting cases in the flood of
tweets’.
Fast pace: Many journalists have
tight deadlines, work in fast-paced
environments, and need to respond
and evaluate sources within a very
short timeframe.
Create a simple and fast way to
verify social media content,
supporting fast-paced journalism
‘You always have a desire to be the
fastest in publishing the big
breaking news’.
Different modalities: The
journalists reported working
increasingly in multimedia
environments with different
modalities (video, photos, text and
audio). Photos and videos are often
difficult to verify.
Video and photos, in particular,
need to be easier to verify.
Therefore, they need to verify the
authenticity of images and video,
by using tools such as Google
reverse image search and the
image-checking tool TinEye, but
even more integrated in existing
working tools and processes.
‘When you choose to publish a
photo or video you need to be
totally sure about the veracity of
that photo or video, and that is
hard’.
In addition to user needs concerning verification, some journalists in this study also
reported a need to gain an overview and support in structuring social media content in the
news process to reap the benefits of underexploited news and data sources. One of the greatest
challenges, reported by many in the interviews, is to keep track of and identify potentially
interesting cases in the flood of incoming tweets. This is a challenge also reported by others
(e.g. Swedish Radio, 2013). For example, one of the participants in our study stated that he
would like to have a tool that would help him identify the most important events of the last
few hours in his own Twitter feed. Many of the interviewed journalists described a concrete
need for more knowledge and better analytical tools to take advantage of the benefits of data
on social media and create more data-driven journalism (see Gray, Chambers, & Bounegru,
2012). Hence, the importance for support in this area is not only in the information gathering
phase, but also in how journalists can process and make sense of all the information or data
available to them.
An interesting question is how the role of social media will be integrated into the
future of journalism. Journalists’ hands-on experience and competence with social media will
most likely increase in the future. However, the complexity of social media journalism will
undoubtedly increase as well. First, we can expect more visual content with the services like
Instagram. Second, we can expect further growth in fast-paced multimedia journalism and
real time news publishing (e.g. Reported.ly), which will complicate the verification process
due to both the high pressure for speed and multimedia competence. The key question will be
how the cost/benefit ratio of speed and verification skills may develop in the coming years
(Wood, 2013).
Critics might say that many of the issues here are not new; they are old issues given
fresh urgency with the rise of social media. However, for news-journalists to be able to live
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
14
up to their values and beliefs (e.g. reporting truthfully and critically), the specific
characteristics of the near-real-time multi-modal information-flow through social media,
imply traditional verification practices are necessary but insufficient. Verification-practices
appear to lag behind the persistent and perhaps increasing importance of verification as a
journalistic value and virtue. Based on our analytical cultural approach (Hanitzsch 2007), and
empirical findings, we identified in general a significant shift in old journalistic practices with
social media having become a crucial source of news, expanding access to alternative and
non-elitist sources. With regard to verification of content and sources, our findings suggest
that traditional journalistic values and traditional journalistic verification practices apply.
Most participants reported relying on traditional verification strategies, while some
additionally used advanced online verification tools, combining high digital competence with
verifications knowledge. We find that social media require journalists to cope with a digital
and high speed, distributed and networked environment "where knowledge and expertise are
more fluid, dynamic, and hybrid" (Hermida et al., 2014, p. 495). 'Everyone' has access to
potential newsworthy sources and content through social media, yet to curate, authenticate,
cross-check and turn unruly and fragmented bits of information into news-stories might very
well partly constitute the raison d'être of future journalism. A key question for the future is
how the increased time and attention spent on verification and other digitally-focused routines
reflect changes in journalistic culture at a more profound level, and what effect these will that
have upon news production. Hence, the critical size and various modalities of social media
content and the challenges related to real-time journalism will demand efficient and effective
verification tools to support journalists in the future.
Limitations and further research
Our study has contributed valuable insights into journalists' value and emerging verification
practices and needs concerning work support. Yet, the present study has limitations. First we
will discuss limitations concerning the study sample. Next we will consider the limitations of
this knowledge as a basis for the development of innovative tools for social media
verification.
Limitations concerning the study sample: The sample in this study was limited by
the inclusion of a preponderance of "older" and male journalists. There might be interesting
gender and age differences in the usage of verification tools in social media journalism. The
Global Digital Journalism Study (2013) finds that younger professionals use more social
media tools, and they do so more often. Our selection of participants included only two
journalists under the age of 30. These two journalists indicated a heavy usage of social media
and that they had a different focus on verification. They typically viewed the published news
more as a living document, where they could edit the text along with an update from new
sources and incoming information. Verification and publishing was therefore understood as
an interrelated process, where verification was something that could happen after and not
necessarily before publishing. Regarding gender differences, the female participants in our
study seemed to be more advanced and more knowledgeable with regards to verification than
the male journalist we interviewed. However, our study included only 6 females out of 24
participants. Future studies should try to include both more female journalists and younger
journalists to compare whether younger versus older professionals and female versus male
journalists have different approaches to the verification of social media content. Finally, we
could not identify any differences among the various nationalities in this study. However, it
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
15
should be noted that a cross-national comparison was not the aim of this explorative study.
The sample was not really suitable for such a comparison, rather it was selected on the basis
to explore emerging verification practices among journalist using social media. Hence, the
study findings are limited to journalists that actually use social media for journalistic
purposes, and cannot unconditionally be generalized to journalists with little or no such
experience. Future research could therefore benefit from a more representative sample
journalist to develop a typology of different practices of verifying sources and information
among journalists with different social media habits.
Limitations of our findings as a basis for the innovation of future tool support: Our
findings provide a valuable basis for the development of future tools to support journalists'
social media verification practices. Nevertheless, it is important to be aware of the limitations
of this basis. It is commonly acknowledged that the elicitation of user requirements is
difficult, if possible at all; in particular for complex work contexts with high prevalence of
tacit knowledge and know-how (Suchman, 1995). Because the context of social media is
likely to change rapidly also in the coming years, it is necessary to continuously challenge any
knowledge of users' needs and requirements throughout an innovation process leading to
improved tool support.
Furthermore, it may be noted that as one common criticism of user-centred approaches
for the purpose of innovation is users' inability to escape the past while thinking about the
future (Benel, 1991). The journalists interviewed in this study thus might have benefitted from
more triggers to think and move ‘outside the box’. Therefore, when challenging user
requirements as part of future innovation processes, it might be beneficial to include usercentred
methods that, to a greater degree, stimulate creative thinking – such as the use of
sketches for early design feedback (Tohidi, Buxton, Baecker & Sellen, 2006).
Conclusion
Our study contributes to theory and user requirements within journalism studies, by
combining multiple levels of analysis, focusing on 1) journalists as users, 2) social media
platforms and future verification tools, and 3) their context of use. We argue that the
transformations in journalistic values, needs and practices with regard to verifying social
media content and sources cannot be understood without considering social media platforms,
its users and the context of work in combination.
The results in the present study indicate that verification of social media content is of
crucial importance to journalists, particularly those reporting breaking news under severe time
constraints. Based on interviews with 24 journalists, we identified five main approaches to the
verification of social media content and sources, yet there are no guided or universal strategies
for verification. In addition, the interviewed journalists reported a need to gain a better
overview and support in structuring social media content in the news process to reap the
rewards of underexploited news and data sources. We conclude that the characteristics of
social media (e.g. diversity of voices, multimodal content, and speed of information-flow,
often un-verified and unknown sources with opaque vested interests) and the increasing
importance of social media as a news-source, make verification as a journalistic value
increasingly important. Yet, at the same time current verification-practices among our
participants are dominated by traditional journalistic methods. Ensuring practices are up to par
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
16
with the journalistic value of verification requires advancing journalistic verification
knowledge and tools.
Our findings point to the emergence of a new style of real-time networked journalism
representing both opportunities and challenges with information overload in an increasingly
multimedia oriented social media landscape. Following our analysis and theoretical
framework, we belive that social media can shape the journalistic culture, due to not only
demands for fast paced publishing and emerging verification strategies, but also how fast
rumours and false information cascades through social media. Hence, there might be less time
to verify news sources, yet the risk of distributing inaccurate and false information may force
journalism into a direction of greater awareness and standarised verification-routines. Based
on this, we improved our general understanding of emerging journalistic verification values
and practices, and also identified user requirements that hopefully will guide the development
of innovations in the area of social media verification.
Acknowledgement
This work was supported by the EC co-funded FP 7 project REVEAL (Project-No FP7-
610928)1
. More information about the REVAL-project can be found at:
http://www.revealproject.eu.
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The European Union is not liable for any use that may be made of the information contained herein. The views
and findings presented here are those of the named authors. They are not necessarily identical with those of
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19
APPENDIX
Table A1. Sample of journalists working in Norway.
Gender Age
range
Country
of work
Work Social media platforms used
Male 21-30 NO News reporter for major
newspaper in Oslo
Mainly Twitter, little use of
Facebook, some blogs and
YouTube
Male 31-40 NO News reporter for major
newspaper in Oslo
Mainly Twitter, some
Facebook and Instagram,
blogs and YouTube
Male 21-30 NO Journalism student, but working
for a major online newspaper
outlet in Oslo
Mainly Twitter and
Facebook, some Instagram,
blogs and YouTube
Male 41-50 NO Investigative journalist for
major newspaper in Oslo
Mainly Twitter and
Facebook
Male 21-30 NO News reporter for major
newspaper in Oslo
Mainly Twitter and
Facebook;
Male 31-40 NO News reporter for major
newspaper in Oslo
Twitter and Facebook
Male 31-40 NO News reporter for major
newspaper in Oslo
Twitter and Facebook
Table A2. Sample of journalists working in Germany, the UK, Denmark, and France.
Gender Age
range
Country of
Work
Work Social media platforms used
Male 41-50 GER Social media coordinator at
broadcaster
Mainly Facebook and Twitter,
YouTube, Google+
Female 31-40 GER Social media trainer/journalist at
broadcaster
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, blogs
Female 41-50 GER Journalist at broadcaster agency Facebook, Twitter, YouTube
Male 41-50 GER Editor at broadcaster Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
Google+
Male 41-50 GER Editor/journalist at broadcaster Mainly Facebook and Twitter,
some YouTube and blogs
Male 31-40 GER Editor at broadcaster Mainly Facebook and Twitter
Male 41-50 FRA Coordinator of new
technologies at news agency
Mainly Twitter and some YouTube
and LinkedIn
Male 31-40 DK Social media editor at
broadcaster
Mainly Facebook and Twitter
Male 41-50 GER Editor-in-chief at broadcaster Mainly Facebook and Twitter,
YouTube
Male 31-40 GER Editor at broadcaster Facebook, Twitter
Female 41-50 GER Journalist at broadcaster Mainly Facebook, Twitter, some
YouTube, blogs, Google+
Male 31-40 GER Journalist/news presenter at
broadcaster
Facebook, Twitter, YouTube,
Instagram, Google+
Female 31-40 UK News journalist at broadcaster Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and
some Instagram, Flickr, Tumblr,
Emerging journalistic verification practices concerning social media -
20
blogs, Google+
Female 31-40 GER Journalist/social media editor at
broadcaster
Twitter
Female 21-30 GER Journalist for various media
outlets
Mainly Facebook, Twitter and
blogs
Male 41-50 GER Journalist at broadcaster Facebook, Twitter, YouTube
Male 41-50 GER Journalist/social media
coordinator at broadcaster
Facebook, Twitter, blogs, Google+
Note: The given country is the country in which the participants worked, not their country of origin/birth.
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