On December 15, Facebook announced that it’s rolling out new features designed to tackle the spread of fake news. In recent months, fact and fiction have become increasingly blurred in news columns around the world with the US presidential election in particular experiencing a tidal wave of misinformation.
The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism recently released a report showing that trust levels in news vary hugely by country. Trust is highest in affluent Western European nations, primarily due to the presence of well-funded public service broadcasters. 65 percent of people in Finland agreed that “you can trust most news most of the time”. In the United States, the epicenter of the fake news storm, trust was far lower at just 33 percent. This chart shows the percent agreeing “you can trust news most of the time” in selected countries.
Source: Statistics Portal