FAKE NEWS WORKSHEET

EXERCISE 1

FAKE NEWS

A story that is presented as being a genuine item of news but is in fact not true and is intended to deceive people.

a. Work with a partner. Discuss this question:

• How does fake news spread?

EXERCISE 2
a. Skim read the text. Answer the questions.

1. Were any of your ideas from Exercise 1 mentioned? If so, what?

2. What is the main purpose of the text? Justify your answer to your partner.

b. Read the text again. Answer the questions according to the text.

1. What makes a bot effective at sharing fake news?

2. How might users within our social network contribute to our confirmation bias?

3. How might being trolled result in you sharing fake news?

4. What is the real-world impact of microtargeting?

c. Summarise the four main paragraphs of the text in around 25 words each.

Paragraph 1:

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Everyday life: Fake news
FAKE NEWS WORKSHEET
Paragraph 2:

Paragraph 3:

Paragraph 4:

EXERCISE 3
a. Match the words in the text in bold with the correct definition.

Word/Phrase Meaning

1. share so much of something that it is difficult to deal with

2. officially proven to be true or correct

3. the fact that we tend to believe something that supports our own views

4. confirm

5. to make people think that something is not true

6. a set of rules that a computer uses for solving problems or calculations

7. not sure about the truth or quality of something

8. careful examination of someone or something

9. to become a feature of something gradually, without anyone noticing

10. false information intended to make people believe something that is not true

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FAKE NEWS WORKSHEET
Word/Phrase Meaning

11. a situation in which people only listen to or read others with the same views, and so are not
receptive to or aware of different views

12. likely to do something, especially something bad

13. making people do what you want by influencing them in a clever or dishonest way

14. easily damaged or affected by something negative or harmful

b. Work with a partner. Use the prompts to ask a question to your partner. Take turns asking and answering questions.

1. why / people / discredit / moon landings ?

2. politicians / manipulative ?

3. know / algorithms / work ?

4. elderly / vulnerable / illness ?

5. prone to / mistakes ?

6. read / dubious / online ?

7. you think / echo chamber / social media ?

8. confirmation bias / sometimes ?

9. bombarded / spam emails / spam filter ?

10. how / stop / spread / disinformation ?

c.Read each extract. Discuss the meaning of each phrase in bold with a partner. If you are unsure, ask a teacher or use
the Macmillan online dictionary to help you.

1. The success of bots in sharing fake news is partly attributed to people.

2. The ‘echo chamber’ phenomenon on social media plays into the hands of bots.

3. … seek to justify their opinion with evidence. That evidence is often shared uncritically, in the heat of the moment.

d. Can you make your own sentences using each phrase?

EXERCISE 4
Work with a partner. Answer the questions.

1. Did any of the information in the text surprise you? If so, what?

2. Which of these factors do you think is the most important for social media users to be aware of?

3. Do you think social media companies should do more to address the issue of fake news? If so, what?

4. What advice would you give social media users about how to limit the spread of fake news?

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Everyday life: Fake news
FAKE NEWS READING TEXT

How is fake news spread?

1. Bots
It is estimated that between 5–10% of all social media
accounts are actually robots (bots for short). Bots can
act like actual people, performing everyday tasks like
sharing content, following other users, commenting and
joining in debates. However, bots are just computer
algorithms – they are simply completing a series of
tasks that they’ve been programmed to do. They can
also learn from patterns of interaction among social
media users, which helps them complete their tasks
more efficiently.
How do bots spread fake news? Well, bots can be
programmed to share information that this not validated
or reliable. What’s more, they can do this on a large scale,
and repetitively too. They can bombard social media with
disinformation, linking this to trending hashtags in order to gain
more exposure.

2. People
The success of bots in sharing fake news is partly attributed to
people. Many of us fall into the trap of confirmation bias – that
is, we are inclined to believe something that supports our
own views. Bots are master manipulators - if they manage
to infiltrate the feeds of users we trust, we may be quick
to reshare that information without questioning it.
Similarly, those who trust us will share that information
too, which only serves to reaffirm or validate our
own beliefs.
The ‘echo chamber’ phenomenon on social media plays
into the hands of bots, but people are prone to sharing
their own dubious content without the help of bots, too.
The sheer amount of information available to us on a
daily basis can make us lazy, and we can tend to skim read
content without much scrutiny.

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Everyday life: Fake news
FAKE NEWS READING TEXT

3. Trolls
There are certain social media users that aim to argue,
intimidate and discredit those that they don’t agree
with. Strong, emotionally-fuelled engagement on
social media is a friend of fake news. Trolling
creates the perfect conditions for fake news to
spread, as both the trolls and those being trolled
seek to justify their opinion with evidence. That
evidence is often shared uncritically, in the heat
of the moment. Furthermore, trolling generates
interest (everyone loves a good argument), meaning
that trolls have a willing audience which may help
fuel certain (questionable) ideas.

4. Microtargeting
Social media sites gather data on their users. They use this
data to filter the information you see to make it more suited
to your interests. The analytics used by these sites can
improve user experience, but they can also be used for
microtargeting. This is when a post is shared with a
specific audience as they are likely to read it, share it,
or interact with it. Some targeted content may seem
harmless, but user data can be passed on to third-
parties which have a more manipulative motive.
One analytics company, Cambridge Analytica, used
Facebook data to help target voters during the 2016
US presidential election campaign. Microtargeting
doesn’t necessarily mean that users will be targeted with
fake news, but it does make them vulnerable to it.

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Everyday life: Fake news