PressOne.PH will launch “Truth Hour” to stress the importance of fighting disinformation online.
Likening disinformation to living in the dark, PressOne.PH will launch the initiative to cast a light on the dangers of disinformation. The launching will coincide with the global observance of Earth Hour on March 26, Saturday.
PressONE.ph is a member of fact-checking coalitions Tsek.ph and #FactsFirstPH. The news team has produced several fact-check articles that debunked erroneous claims made online.
However, the independent news organization was recently the subject of a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack that flooded its website with millions of online traffic to shut down the site.
And to prove that the fight against disinformation is everybody’s business, PressONE.ph will use the yearly celebration of Earth Hour but with a twist.
While the Earth Hour celebration calls for the turning off of artificial light for one hour (from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m.) as an expression of support for nature and our planet, PressOne’s “Truth Hour” will use that dark hour to illustrate that those who consume and share information from untrustworthy sources are living in the dark. Only through the truth and facts can we dispel the darkness of disinformation.
Through its social media accounts, PressOne will feature a series of quotes cards about the parallelism of darkness and disinformation, light and facts. The cards will feature a fact-check story and the rating from PressOne’s fact-checkers. The link to the fact-check story will be posted in the comments section for everyone to read.
“By playing with the analogy of darkness and disinformation, we will promote the importance of debunking disinformation in a more creative and engaging way. It’s not our usual straightforward fact-checked posts. We want something more creative and interesting to raise the public’s awareness on the importance of living under the light of truth,” Rommel Lopez, Associate Editor of PressOne.PH, said.
The Truth Hour campaign will continue even after the hour. PressOne.PH will continue to light up the world with facts to dispel the darkness of disinformation one fact-check story at a time.