UNESCO Empowers Journalists to Counter Disinformation and Misinformation

As disinformation and misinformation escalates during the current pandemic, public’s access to trusted and timely information becomes ever more vital. More than ever, we are aware of the urgency of fighting disinformation and strengthening quality journalism. Journalists have a pivotal role to play in reporting effectively and to deliver reliable public information during critical times.

To empower journalists, journalism educators, and future journalists to perform such critical tasks, UNESCO had launched the English version of the “Journalism, ‘Fake News’ and Disinformation: A Handbook for Journalism Education and Training” back in 2018. The popular handbook is also available now in Malay and Tetum languages.

“By providing useful and practical resources in local languages, we aim to reach even more people and help stem the spread of infodemic that is harming the society,” said Dr. Shahbaz Khan, the Director of UNESCO Jakarta and Representative of UNESCO to Brunei Darussalam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines and Timor Leste.

The handbook is becoming an essential resource for journalism educators and practitioners globally to practice journalism in digital age. The handbook explores the nature of journalism, importance of facts, cause of information disorder, media and information literacy as a tool to fight disinformation and misinformation, fact checking 101, social media verification and how to fight against online abuse.

The UNESCO handbook “Journalism, ‘Fake News’ and Disinformation” in Malay and Tetum are freely available for everyone to download. The handbook are also available in other languages including English, French, Arabic, Russian, Portuguese, Kazakh, Kyrgyz, Tajik, Indonesian, Thai and Vietnamese.