Russian government launches page to ‘expose fake news about Russia’

Since the election and the widespread reading of purposely falsified news, many media outlets and social media companies have launched efforts to combat the spread of fake news.

Now, you can count the Russian government on that list, though its tactic for the process is a little different.

Maria Zakharova, of the Russian Foreign Ministry, announced the creation of a page on the ministry’s website dedicated to exposing “fake news” about Russia, according to Nathan Hodge, the Moscow bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal.

But unlike outlets such as Politifact, which analyze a piece of news they deem fake and give explanations, timelines and interviews about why the facts do not support the article, the Russian government simply slaps on a large red label with the word “FAKE” in all-caps and then provide a one-sentence rebuke of the article without any real explanation.

Articles pinpointed on the Russian website include a New York Times story with the headline “Russia deploys missile, violating treaty and challenging Trump,” a Bloomberg story with the headline “France’s presidential front-runner says Russia is hacking him now” and a Santa Monica Observer headline that says “Vitaly Churkin is 5th Suspicious Death of Russian Diplomat in 3 months.”

Every article has the same one-line explanation for the fake label: The article has “data that do not correspond to reality.”

Headlines about Russian officials hacking the U.S. election and anything about President Donald Trump’s connection to Russia are absent.

This story was originally published February 22, 2017 at 10:05 AM with the headline "Russian government launches page to ‘expose fake news about Russia’."