Check five real claims from your feeds or chat groups using lateral reading and image search.
Allow about thirty minutes. Claims get forwarded in chat groups and posted in feeds every day, and most arrive with no source attached. The way to get quicker at sorting them is to check real ones you have actually seen, using two methods you already know: lateral reading, from Lesson 6.2, and reverse image search, from Lesson 6.3, "Checking images and video". Most checks take five minutes or less, though one will probably take longer than the rest, which is normal.
Go through your own chat groups and social feeds from the past week or two and pick five claims that were shared as fact. Skip obvious jokes and opinions. At least one claim must be an image, such as a photo shared as news, and at least one must be a statistic, such as "X per cent of Singaporeans" or "prices have risen by Y". The rest can be any type: a health tip, a rumour about a shop or a policy, a quote attributed to someone, or a screenshot of an announcement.
Set up a table with seven columns: the claim, where you saw it, when you saw it, the original source, what you checked, the rating, and a note. Copy each claim in word for word, and fill in where and when you saw it before you start checking.
For text claims, use lateral reading. Search for the claim itself and for any source it names. If it cites a study, find the study. If it quotes an official, find the statement on the agency's own website. If it names a news outlet, find the article on that outlet's own website.
For images, run a reverse image search with at least two tools and note the earliest appearance you find.
For statistics, find who produced the number and what it actually measured. Numbers drift as they get passed along, and a broad figure can start out as a narrow one, so "one in three" can begin as "one in three of the 200 people surveyed by a company selling the product".
Record every source you open in the "what you checked" column, including the ones that led nowhere. If no original turns up after a reasonable search, write "could not find" in the original source column, since that counts as a result in the same way a found source does.
Give each claim one of four ratings:
Confirmed: you found the original from a credible source, and it says what the claim says. False: credible sources directly contradict the claim, or the image comes from a different time or place. Misleading: something real sits underneath, but the claim distorts it. A real study stretched beyond its findings, a real quote cut short and a real photo with a wrong caption all count. Unconfirmed: you could not find enough evidence either way.
People often forget Misleading, and it is often the right rating, because most viral claims are not made up from nothing but start from something real that has been bent. Use the note column to say how you reached each rating.
Hafiz filled in part of a table like this, and the claims are examples. The first was a forwarded message saying a supermarket chain would close all its branches next month. Hafiz searched the chain's name plus "closing", checked its official website and social media, and looked at major news sites. Nothing turned up about closures, and the chain had posted about a new branch opening the week before, so Hafiz rated it False.
The second was a photo of a long queue outside a clinic, captioned "Covid is back, clinics overwhelmed". Google Lens matched it to a news photo from several years earlier. The photo is real but old, so Hafiz rated it Misleading.
The third said, "A study shows drinking coffee after 3pm causes insomnia." Hafiz found the study, which looked at caffeine close to bedtime rather than at 3pm, so this one was also rated Misleading.
The fourth was a screenshot of a gov.sg message about a change to a public holiday. Hafiz found the same message on the official gov.sg channel and rated it Confirmed. The fifth was a quote about property prices attributed to a well-known businessman, which Hafiz found nowhere except in reposts, so it went down as Unconfirmed.
Draft one correction for a claim you rated False. If none came out False, write it for a Misleading one. A good correction is short, polite and specific. It says what is wrong, gives the source, and does not make the person who shared the claim look foolish. People forward things because they care about the group, and a correction that embarrasses the sharer makes them defensive, after which other people stop listening too.
Match the tone of the group you are writing for, since a family chat may need a gentler opening than a work group.
Hafiz wrote this for the supermarket rumour: "Hi all, I checked this one. There's nothing about closures on the company's website or on any news site, and they just opened a new branch last week. Looks like a false rumour, so probably best not to forward it."
Write your correction even if you decide not to post it, because having the words ready makes the next time much easier.
You are done when your table has five rows, each with the claim, every source you opened, a rating and a note on how you reached it, and you have at least one correction drafted in the words you would actually use. Start with the claim that made you feel strongest when you first saw it.
Fill in a five-row fact-check table with sources and ratings, then draft one polite correction to post in a group chat.
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