CrossCheck APAC

07/03/2024

First Nations people in South Australia are heading to the polls on March 16 to vote for representatives in the state's, and Australia's first, Indigenous Voice to Parliament advisory body.

We've debunked some of the misleading narratives about the election, check them out via our Insta: https://www.instagram.com/p/C4M9Tc9NXw4/

15/02/2024

Dog whistling – or implicit messaging – is the art of saying one thing while meaning another. It relies on implication, suggestion and interpretation and for this reason is not easy to debunk. Here we've got some tips for you on how to better spot and call out dog whistles when you come across them:

02/02/2024

Online hate content is something we keep track of since it may lead to real-world harm. Find out how some of this week's news stories prompted hateful reactions online via our Insta: https://www.instagram.com/p/C21ZgXZROwT

30/01/2024

We spotted an online campaign earlier this month promoting the idea of an "Australia Month" i.e. an extension of Australia Day, seemingly to counter calls to boycott the day. The campaign, which also promotes anti-immigrant narratives, has been using AI-generated images to share its message. More details in the report below:

Dreamt up by a Proud Boy and pushed by neo-Nazis, online verification outlet RMIT CrossCheck has found that 'Australia Month' has found support from fringe politicians and media figures.

25/01/2024

AI voice cloning is influencing elections past, present and upcoming. Most of the time we'd get sent an audio clip supposedly featuring a candidate, when in fact they never said what's in the clip - it's all created using AI technologies.

It's almost impossible to tell just by listening whether it's a human's voice or one created by computer, but that doesn't mean we are doomed. Here are what social media users, researchers, educators and tech companies can do to protect voters against audio deepfakes:

19/01/2024

Stepping into 2024 we've been warned that disinformation is the number one global risk in the biggest election year in history. Online, everyone is worried about not being able to tell what comes from humans and what is generated by AI (or both).

Prebunking may just be what you need to learn and practise ahead of a year of election disinformation.

Want to learn more? Please check out our free toolkit via the link in the comment section.

15/12/2023

Disinformation plagued the Voice referendum. At the same time, fact-checking efforts and media coverage of dubious narratives never stopped during the referendum cycle. So what could everyone have done better to help the public mitigate false claims and half-truths?

Please check out our latest research report: through a detailed data analysis, coupled with additional expert advice, we offered a few tips on how the media can improve their disinformation reporting and help slow its spread.

13/12/2023

Our visual and audio analysis on a controversial video related to a pro-Palestine protest in Sydney was featured in this report by Crikey:

Edited videos from the Australian Jewish Association prompted global outrage, but further evidence corroborating its claims has not emerged.

07/12/2023

We analysed the misleading narratives and tropes that hit countries where wildfires occurred earlier this year, since we may have an 'increased risk of fires' here in Australia according to Australian Financial Complaints Authority, and El Niño would bring hotter and drier weather conditions, Bureau of Meteorology said.

Through studying the trending narratives, common tropes and tactics used to spread disinformation we can build our resilience against it.

Check out our Insta for more: https://www.instagram.com/p/C0i0OM-up84

30/11/2023

CrossCheck's forensic analysis of out-of-context videos about the war in Gaza is featured in this SBS News report

30/11/2023

Is your newsroom currently debating whether to incorporate AI in your work? This pros and cons list may be helpful to you.

For a closer look at what other newsrooms around the globe are doing with AI, and what it can potentially do for your reporting, head to our Insta 👉 https://www.instagram.com/p/C0QqUWZtEqZ

27/11/2023

We spoke to SBS News about several videos that have been used to advance the "Pallywood" narrative.

Pallywood i.e. Palestine + Hollywood, is a theory that suggests, often without evidence or misleadingly, that some Palestinians are manipulating the media during conflicts with Israel.

With the 'sheer amount of misinformation' circulating about the Hamas-Israel war, SBS News has worked with fact checkers to investigate some of the claims made online.

23/11/2023

We ran a public tipline for 4 months ahead of the Voice to Parliament referendum and found that demand for help in countering misinformation remains strong.

Please check out our latest article detailing what we learned from the experience via the link in the comment section.

16/11/2023

We just published a new report investigating a conspiracy theory about a UN plan to "land grab" via Australia's Voice to Parliament referendum. We tracked when it started circulating online and how it's evolved since then.

Please check it out via the link in the comment section.

02/11/2023

To help New Zealand journalists prepare for the general election this year, we ran a series of live crisis simulations with support from Google News Initiative. We designed the scenarios to help encourage journalists to think about the consequences of reporting - or not reporting - on dubious online claims.

It was a lot of fun! Thanks to our participants for coming along.

30/10/2023

Community engagement is key in media literacy education so at the invitation of Ballarat Libraries, our partnership and community lead Miguel D'Souza travelled to Ballarat over the weekend and met with members of the community. Miguel brought with him some important tips against online scams and shared his expertise in navigating OSINT tools that could be instrumental in unmasking a scam.

If your newsroom/organisation is after some advice in detecting and warding off scams, get in touch via DM.

26/10/2023

One way to trace a person's digital footprint is to establish their social media presence, so that you can further analyse content they posted online in the past. Here's a tutorial on how to find someone's social media profiles across various platforms.

For a shortcut guide on source verification, check out our post on Insta: https://www.instagram.com/p/Cy2lg42PGD-

22/10/2023

Our director Anne Kruger spoke to SBS News about the lack of quality information needed to dispel misinformation about the ongoing Israel-Hamas conflict

Fact-checkers have identified dozens of fake and misleading videos about the Hamas-Israel war on social media, including footage from video games. They say information is being weaponised.