Fake news can travel around the world before a fact-check is written. These five signs should make you pause before you share.<\/p>\n
Clickbait is built to provoke. If a headline feels too outrageous to be true, read the article. Often the body is far more ordinary than the headline.<\/p>\n
Red flags:<\/strong> ALL CAPS, stacks of exclamation points, and phrases like \u201cYou won\u2019t believe\u2026\u201d or \u201cThey don\u2019t want you to know\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n Serious outlets put a name on the work. Anonymous posts, or vague \u201cexperts say\u201d with no names, are a warning. Ask: who wrote this, what are their credentials, and why are the sources hidden?<\/p>\n Search the claim on other reputable sites. A major story that lives only on one obscure page is usually not a scoop. It is usually wrong.<\/p>\n Newsrooms employ editors. Repeated typos, broken grammar, and frantic phrasing often mean there was no editorial process \u2014 a common mark of fake-news mills.<\/p>\n Lookalike domains are a classic trick. One extra word or a swapped extension can turn a trusted brand into a counterfeit. Read the address bar, not just the logo.<\/p>\n If you see these signs, do not share. Check the claim with a reputable fact-checker such as Snopes, FactCheck.org, or PolitiFact. Sixty seconds of caution stops a lie from travelling further.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Learn to spot fake news with these five warning signs. Protect yourself from misinformation with practical checks you can use in under a minute.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":56,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-media-literacy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/10\/feat-fake-news.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18\/revisions\/36"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/56"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stop-the-rot.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}2. No real author or source<\/h2>\n
3. The story appears nowhere else<\/h2>\n
4. Sloppy writing<\/h2>\n
5. The URL is doing an impression<\/h2>\n
What to do next<\/h2>\n