Tag Archives: Google News Initiative

Read all about it: A new look for Google News

The rise of social media, mobile devices, notifications, apps and news sites around the world means people have more ways to get news than ever before. Google News gives people a simple way to cut through the noise and easily find out what’s important in their local community and around the world. From local and regional news outlets to national and global perspectives, Google News brings together diverse journalism to help us better understand our world.

Our vision for Google News is focused on strengthening access to local news, providing access to a diverse range of sources, and addressing misinformation while protecting the open web.

Today we're announcing a number of ways we're working to help people around the world find a broad array of authoritative news, through global support to news organizations and product innovation.

The new Google News

Google News is available in over 125 countries and 40 languages. Each month, people click through from Google Search and Google News results to publishers’ websites more than 24 billion times. Google’s algorithms use machine learning to analyze hundreds of different factors to identify and organize the stories being covered around the world.

To help people dive deeper into important stories and more easily find local news from around the world, today we’re launching a redesigned, more customizable Google News experience for desktop.

Our new look for Google News on desktop was inspired by feedback we received from readers. We’ve made it easier for you to catch up on the most important news by bringing Top stories, Local news and personalized picks for you to the top of the page.

This image shows an example of how the Google News desktop page will look like in its new redesign. We've brought local news up to the top of the page and made it easier for you to customize the topics you want to follow

The newly redesigned Google News on desktop, with local news now easier to find.

As an example, we’ve moved our local news section to the top of the page, so it’s easier to find. You can now use the filter button to add multiple locations to your local news section, so you’ll never miss important news about the cities and towns you care about. This change is just the latest way we’re bringing local news to users around the world. Last year, we expanded a feature on Google Search so readers around the world can now see a carousel of local news stories when Google finds local news coverage relevant to their query. This helps them easily find stories from local news publishers.

To make sure this Google News desktop homepage feels truly yours, you now have the ability to customize the topics that appear. This new feature makes it simple to scroll and click through to the stories that most interest you. You can add, remove or reorder topics – just click the blue customize button in the top right of the Your Topics section to get started.

This image shows Your Topics on the Google News desktop redesign

Your Topics now makes it easy to customize the subjects you’d like to follow.

This image shows a zoomed in example of the customization box you may get if you wan to customize the Your Topics section of Google News. You can select what you want to follow (Business, for example) and reorder them on the page.

An example of the customization options for Topics in the new Google News desktop.

To help you make more informed judgments about the information you come across online, we’ve expanded our Fact Check section in Google News on desktop to provide more context. In addition to headlines, you’ll now see the original claim made along with the fact-checked assessment from independent organizations.

This is one of the many ways Google is helping support media literacy. You can also find more information about sources right on Google Search, called About This Result. Next to related Search results, you’ll see three dots that you can tap to learn more about the result and where the information is coming from. With this extra context, you can follow expert recommendations to check the source and see what others say about a topic, helping you make more informed decisions about the sites you may want to visit and what results will be most useful for you.

As part of our announcements today to bring a redesigned Google News to people globally, we’re also announcing that after an eight-year hiatus, Google News is returning to Spain. This is a result of a new copyright law and we hope that the return of Google News to Spain helps more people find more news, from more places, and helps publishers find new readers

How we’re helping journalists

Having access to news goes beyond individuals’ experiences day to day – it's also about finding ways to help the news industry stay successful. Through the Google News Initiative, we partner with news publishers around the world to build a long-lasting, diverse and innovative news industry. We do this by offering training, programs, funding and products to journalists and newsrooms to help strengthen their work in the digital age.

One of the GNI’s goals is to elevate the work of diverse publications around the world. As part of that effort, we’re officially opening the applications for our Global News Equity Fund, our multi-million dollar commitment to help bring more diversity and equity to the news industry. Independent journalists and small and medium-sized news organizations producing original news for minority and underrepresented audiences are eligible to apply by July 21 for funding to support and expand their news operations.

We’re also announcing the first round of recipients of The Data-Driven Reporting Project, a partnership between the GNI and the Medill School of Journalism, Media, Integrated Marketing Communications at Northwestern University. The first round of funding awards around $1 million to help journalists serving local and underrepresented communities, supporting their work to publish document-based or data driven investigative stories. The 22 winners are from the U.S. and Canada. Medill will provide specialized training, expertise and resources to award recipients. Google played no role in the selection of jurors or individual projects. Applications for a second round will open later this year.

As another part of our continued commitment to supporting local news in the U.S., we’ll invest in a local news advertising campaign placed with local outlets. We’ll also continue to partner with local news associations to offer programs that will support long-term digital transformation and sustainability.

20 years of Google News

This year marks the 20th anniversary of Google News. When it launched, Google News broke new ground in news aggregation by gathering links in real time, grouping articles by story and ranking stories from publishers worldwide.

This image shows how Google News on desktop looked in 2002 versus how it looks now in 2022.

How Google News on desktop looked in 2002 versus how it looks now in 2022.

The world has changed a lot in the past 20 years – and the way people learn and seek information, and how news organizations cover the news, have changed with it. At Google, we’re committed to work with publishers, governments and civil society to build a future of news that meets the new ways people look for and consume news.

Here’s to the next 20 years.

Supporting journalists who are taking a stand

Irene Jay Liu leads Google News Lab, part of the Google News Initiative, in the Asia Pacific region. An experienced political, investigative and data journalist, she was a 2017 finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in national reporting as part of the Reuters team that documented widespread cheating in U.S. college admissions.

Now, with News Lab, Irene promotes innovation and the use of technology in newsrooms. We talked to her about the dizzying pace of change in Asia, building a united front against misinformation and why journalists in the region are so willing to experiment.

What did you do before you came to Google?

My first full-time reporting job, in 2007, was eliminated by budget cuts before my first day. That was my introduction to the industry. Luckily, I landed a job in Albany, New York covering politics. It was a perfect introduction to modern reporting: I filed for the newspaper, ran the political blog, did radio bits for NPR and was an on-air reporter for the local PBS station.

Left: Irene Jay Liu, seated in a small, cluttered office, talks with three fellow journalists. Right: Irene Jay Liu, holding a camera, and observes the busy scene at an event in a banquet hall.

Covering New York state politics for the Albany Times Union

In 2010, I moved to Hong Kong to work for the South China Morning Post. There was something about Asia, and Hong Kong in particular, that drew me to the region — we didn’t know how the story would end. The intervening 12 years have proved that out. History took a very different turn than anyone could have predicted. So it’s really been an education.

Later I moved to Reuters, where I led development of Connected China, an immersive data-driven app, and then worked as an investigative reporter on their enterprise team. So I’ve also had the luxury of being part of ambitious, innovative data projects.

What are some challenges journalists face in the Asia Pacific region?

Change is the only constant in Asia Pacific. We're seeing more and more pressure on journalists and the erosion of press freedom, not only in Asia, but globally. Despite this, there's a strong sense of mission and purpose — that the work needs to be done. What has always amazed me is how newsrooms here are willing to collaborate with Google — and each other — to problem-solve and innovate. There’s this agility that’s really inspiring.

Passengers go up stairs in a crowded subway in Sydney
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What do you think fuels that willingness to experiment?

I think it’s that history is moving at such a fast clip here. Journalists in the field can see the connection between freedom of expression, freedom of the press and the stability of their democracies and societies, because they remember a time when things were very, very different. They’ve seen the threat of misinformation and how it can be a matter of life and death, especially in the pandemic.

So there’s this visceral need to make it work, a sense that “we don't have a choice, we have to figure it out as an industry.” Otherwise, the trajectory of history can change very quickly.

Can you give an example?

CekFakta in Indonesia launched ahead of the presidential election in 2019. It was really just a few journalists and folks from the nonprofit sector who came together and said, “We have an election coming, misinformation really affected thelast one. We need to take a stand.”

Because of their hard work, on top of everything else they're doing, they convinced 24 news organizations — top publications that are constantly competing — to work out of the same room, collaboratively fact-checking presidential debates, and again on election day, to counter misinformation as it appeared.

What are some other ways News Lab works with journalists in the region to address misinformation?

Misinformation is top of mind almost everywhere in the region, and journalists feel as if it’s their cross to bear.

One project we recently supported in the Philippines is #FactsFirstPH, a project to connect journalism with the rest of the society ahead of their national elections. A coalition of news organizations came together to collaborate on fact-checking, working in tandem with researchers who analyzed patterns of misinformation, and then partnering with civil society organizations to amplify those fact checks, and with the legal community to hold candidates accountable.

We're seeing more of this multi-sector collaboration. That's what’s encouraging: experimentation, collaboration and the embrace of technology to tackle these issues.

Are we better equipped to address misinformation than we were a few years ago?

There's greater awareness, but it hasn’t translated into institutions gaining trust. People are just more skeptical. That’s the challenge newsrooms face.

What’s interesting in Asia is that you have people coming online for the first time, so there’s an opportunity to develop awareness and resistance to misinformation from the start.

Syed Nazakat, Surbhi Pandit Nangia and Shivalee Kaushik of DataLEADs have a conversation while seated together at a table looking at laptops.
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In India, we’ve piloted this approach through FactShala, which teaches news and information literacy to first-time internet users. Employing a curriculum designed from a baseline study of first-time internet users, Factshala partners with trusted sources — civil society organizations, nonprofits, community workers, educators, journalists — to get the word out in multiple languages.

Are you optimistic about the future of journalism?

I am. I miss being a reporter every day, and I’m constantly humbled and inspired by the journalists I have the privilege to work with here. Their ingenuity and tenacity, in the face of sometimes overwhelming adversity, is the reason I believe journalism will thrive.

And there's so much that we at Google can do to support this work. As long as we listen to the journalism community and respond to what they need, there's a lot we can achieve together.

How data drives a hyperlocal news strategy in Los Angeles

Editor’s Note from Ludovic Blecher, Head of Google News Initiative Innovation: The GNI Innovation Challengeprogram is designed to stimulate forward-thinking ideas for the news industry. The story below by Gabriel Kahn, professor at USC Annenberg School of Journalism, is part of an innovator seriessharing inspiring stories and lessons from funded projects.

The Crosstown team of 10 represented by a cartoon line up which includes their names.

One year ago, our team at the University of Southern California started the Crosstown Neighborhood Data Project. Rapidly expanding news deserts - areas that receive no regular news coverage - can be seen across the US. Small town newspapers are drying up, and toxic “pink-slime” pseudo journalism is seeping in. These news deserts are growing even in big cities. Los Angeles has lost four local papers recently, and so many neighborhoods are overlooked by the news outlets that remain. That is why we started covering every corner of Los Angeles with a four-person editorial team.

It sounds impossible, but it’s not. Here’s how we did it, and what we learned. 

Each week, Crosstown sends out 110 unique email newsletters, one for each neighborhood in this city of four million. The newsletter features brief news stories that hit people where they live: charts and graphics on the number of new COVID infections and vaccination rates, plus pieces about housing, crime and traffic in each neighborhood. 

How do we do this? Through data. We’ve been collecting a trove of information on how Los Angeles lives, works and gets around. All this data is free, but much of it is hard to read and is stored on clunky local government websites. We scrape the data and organize it by neighborhood. That way we can quickly tell how many homes were burglarized in Hollywood last month, or figure out the neighborhood where the most new buildings are going up.

We then write one template for our newsletter, and our custom-built software creates 110 different versions, each with the proper data, visualizations and context for that neighborhood. This wasn’t easy. Our software engineering team spent a year building it, funded by the Google News Initiative Innovation Challenge. We’ve now sent out more than 60 sets of weekly newsletters and learned a great deal. 

Increased engagement

Our biggest takeaway is that people truly engage with news when it’s about their neighborhood. The open rates on our newsletter are over 70%. Most weeks they exceed 80%. The lowest we ever recorded was 55%. This compares to the industry standard for news-related newsletter opening rates (22% according to MailChimp or just under 24% according to CampaignMonitor).

Why? People can’t get this news anywhere else. No other news organizations deliver this level of hyper-localized data. Second, it’s news people want. Currently, there is a widespread impression that Los Angeles is in the midst of a crime wave. Giving people verified stats about their neighborhood and explaining the broader context, such as whether a particular type of crime is rising or falling and how their area compares to others in the city, is a vital public service. 

One example of this is that in one of our newsletters we included the number of building demolitions that had taken place in each neighborhood. A reader then had hard data for her Hollywood neighborhood, which she took to city planners and made a public testimony to convey endangered and historic sites.

Our newsletter also hits the inbox with an appealing subject line, such as “Omicron’s impact on Koreatown,” or, “How much illegal dumping is happening in Venice?” When you live in a big city, it can be difficult to get a read on your own neighborhood. A weekly email with some basic information can be invaluable. 

We’ve found it’s also a great way to engage the audience. Some neighborhoods are battling pressing issues such as traffic congestion or rapidly rising rents. When we cover that in a story, they write back wanting to know more. This allows us to figure out who cares about what across an entire city. In the year since we launched, traffic to the website has increased by 30%.

More importantly, we have a tenfold increase in our audience reaching back out to us. We now know what neighborhoods these audience members live in, because they respond to us directly from their neighborhood email account. This helps us understand which issues are most important to people in different parts of the city.

We’re only at the beginning of understanding what kind of hyperlocal stories we can tell. But our goals for this year lie beyond Los Angeles. We’re now piloting our project with three other newsrooms and we’re hoping to find even more that want to try this technology and approach. We believe using data in this way can be a powerful tool to help newsrooms reach and engage new audiences without raising costs.

Lessons from the International Journalism Festival

The International Journalism Festival in Perugia, Italy, is back after a two year hiatus due to the pandemic. As we arrived in the beautiful city, the energy was palpable as new connections were made, and familiar faces from around the world, and across the journalism community reunited. We had the privilege of hearing from reporters, news entrepreneurs and publishers of all sizes during the festival. We listened and participated in panels that discussed everything from innovation and DEI in the newsroom, to advocating for quality journalism and experimenting with new digital revenue streams. We also announced some key developments for the Google News Initiative in Europe, including:

I’ve been going to this festival since 2017 and I learn something new every time. Here are a couple of my personal takeaways this year:

Innovation is sprouting in more regions, and in new and different ways

Whether it's exploring new business models, boosting reader engagement or working with technology to transform newsrooms, news organizations across Europe are innovating. One comment that resonated is that innovation is often placed in the ‘important, but not urgent pile’ when in fact if we are to successfully adapt to uncertainty and thrive then it’s a priority.

Digital skills will enable a new wave of journalism

Learning and career development can often take a back seat when you’re a journalist writing to a deadline. However, from my own newsroom experience, I know journalists are lifelong learners. At Perugia, we met freelance and newsroom journalists who are developing the necessary digital skills to combat misinformation, engage specialist topics and experiment with different digital publishing platforms, including podcasts, newsletters, virtual events and video.

We need to better support the mental health of journalists

The psychological toll of covering the daily news agenda, along with a sense of ‘burnout’ is a pervasive issue amongst journalists. In addition to the unique pressures of being a professional journalist, the past two years have pushed many to the breaking point. New initiatives to help restore the mental health of journalists are underway, including a new expert program from HeadlinesNet and MINDCharity to create a suite of mental health resources to specifically address the needs of journalists. In short, if the role of a journalist is truly sustainable we require a renewed focus on mental health practices.

Diversity in the newsroom

Many discussions centered around the impact diversity in the newsroom has in helping to better reflect the views of underrepresented audiences. By focusing on solving problems for a specific community, news organisations are differentiating themselves and creating value for their readers.

I’m leaving Perugia inspired to experiment, to share the learnings with my team and beyond, and to try new approaches to big challenges. Thank you to the organizers of this year's event, to the countless volunteers who enabled the festival to take place, and to all the journalists and journalism students we met this year. Here’s to 2023!

Note from the Editor: If you enjoyed this post, watch this short videofeaturing Matt’s highlights from the festival

Listen to Matt’s highlights from the festival
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News Showcase is launching in Slovakia

Journalists have long been committed to providing reliable information to people when they need it, with the last few weeks proving this more than ever. With products like Search and News, Google is committed to helping people find reliable and relevant information.

Today we're going further in our support for journalism in Slovakia by rolling out Google News Showcase, our product and licensing program for news publishers.

Google has signed partnerships with six Slovak publications including national news outlets, a television broadcaster and a press agency, which provide essential news coverage to people all over the country. The titles included in the News Showcase launch in Slovakia are Nový čas, Denník N, SME, TA3, Topky and Webnoviny. We’ll continue to work with other news partners in the country to add additional resources in the future. News Showcase is part of our global investment in news and reinforces our commitment to journalism in Slovakia and around the world.

This GIF shows examples of News Showcase panels from publishers in Slovakia as they scroll through Google News. Publishers appearing include Nový čas, Denník N, SME, TA3, Topky and Webnoviny.

An example of how News Showcase can look for some of our partners in Slovakia

News Showcase panels can appear on Google products, currently on News and Discover, and direct readers to the full articles on publishers’ websites, helping them deepen their relationships with readers. Panels will also include extended access to paywalled content from select participating publishers to give readers even more from their favorite sources, with the intention of leading to more subscribers for the news organization. In addition to the revenue that comes directly from these more-engaged readers, participating publishers will receive monthly licensing payments from Google.

“At SME, we realize that only high-quality and independent journalism will gain long-term support from subscribers,” says Peter Macinga, Chief Digital Officer of Petit Press, the publisher of SME and of other national and regional news titles in Slovakia. “We appreciate our partnership with Google on News Showcase, which will make our premium content available to an even larger audience.”

“Dennik N only exists thanks to the support of our subscribers, and we are therefore always looking for ways to provide them with faster and more convenient access to information,” says Lukas Fila, CEO of N Press, the first Slovak national publisher that made a move to derive the majority of their revenue from subscriptions. “Google News Showcase is a new way for our interviews, investigative journalism and analyses to reach readers. With the free access to some of our normally paywalled content, brand new audiences will be able to try out access to our paid articles.”

Since we launched News Showcase in October 2020, we’ve signed deals with more than 1,400 news publications around the world and have launched in 15 countries including India, Japan, Germany, Portugal, Brazil, Austria, the U.K., Australia, Czechia, Italy, Colombia, Argentina, Canada, Ireland and now Slovakia, bringing more in-depth, essential news coverage to Google News and Discover users.

This image shows examples of how some publishers in Slovakia will appear using News Showcase panels

An example of how News Showcase panels will look with some of our partners in Slovakia

“As one of the longest established media companies in Slovakia, we are glad to be among the first to participate in this Google project,” says Samuel Schlarmann, Digital Media director of news agency SITA, a national news outlet. “We are glad that we can develop our journalistic, analytical and digital skills in this direction. We see our partnership in Google News Showcase as an opportunity to bring our work closer to new readers, and we firmly believe that we will enrich the Google platform with quality content.”

Google News Showcase is our latest effort to support publishers and the news industry in Slovakia. We supported 12 local Slovak newsrooms through the Google News Initiative’s Journalism Emergency Relief Fund to help them continue their vital work during the COVID-19 pandemic, and provided 1.5 million euros to support six Digital News Innovation Fund experimental news projects, from titles such as SME, Denník N, Postoj and Vot. Around the world, the Google News Initiative has supported more than 7,000 news partners in over 120 countries and territories. Since 2015, the Google News Lab has trained more than 300 Slovak journalists, newsroom staff and journalism students on a range of digital tools to help them research, verify and visualize their stories.

Google also sends eight billion visits each month to European news websites from products like Search and News, which publishers can monetize with online advertising and subscriptions on their websites and apps. Our ad technologies enable news organizations to sell their ad space to millions of advertisers globally.

We’re dedicated to continuing our contribution to and collaboration with the news ecosystem, supporting the open web and continuing to provide access to information in Slovakia and elsewhere.

A new fellowship for experiments in journalism and AI

Last year, 24 international newsrooms participated in the JournalismAI Collab Challenge, a Google News Initiative partnership with Polis, the journalism think-tank at the London School of Economics and Political Science. Their goal was to help journalists around the world build solutions, powered by artificial intelligence, to enhance their reporting capabilities.

Together, they prototyped helpful tools such as AFP and The Guardian’s machine learning solution to accurately extract quotes from news articles, the Political Misogynistic Discourse Monitor, which detects hate speech against women in several languages, and a guide to using AI and satellite imagery for storytelling.

To grow this collaboration, we are launching a newJournalism AI Fellowship Programme for 20 journalists and technologists in Europe, Asia-Pacific and the Americas to explore and experiment with new ideas.

This program is aimed at professionals with some experience in AI and will run for six months, from June to December 2022. It is fully virtual and has been designed for Fellows to be able to dedicate six to eight hours a week to their project, whilst keeping up with their day-to-day responsibilities at work.

Rather than individual Fellows, we’re inviting two people from the same organizations – one with an editorial role and one with a technical role – to apply for the program. Each pair will collaborate with another pair from a different publisher to form a team of four.

Each team will be provided with mentoring and coaching opportunities and get access to JournalismAI’s global network of 4,000 experts, researchers and innovators. A budget of $6,000 per team will also help cover project-related expenses.

At the end of the program, participants will present their work and lessons they learned at the third edition of the JournalismAI Festival, the yearly gathering of the JournalismAI community.

Applications for the JournalismAI Fellowship Programme are reviewed on a rolling basis and close on Thursday April 28 at 11:59 PM GMT. To learn more about the process, please visit the program’s website and sign up for the JournalismAI newsletter.

An Innovation Challenge for Europe

Whether it's exploring new business models, boosting reader engagement or working with technology to transform newsrooms, news organizations across Europe continue to innovate. That’s why today we are announcing the first Google News Initiative Innovation Challenge for the region, designed to provide support for some of the small and medium-sized organizations which provide credible information when it’s needed most.

This new program follows the GNI’s previous initiative for the region, the Digital News Innovation Fund. The DNI Fund supported 662 ambitious projects in digital journalism, ranging from giving investigative journalists tools to collaborate across borders, to creating open-source software that helps independent journalism business models thrive, to using virtual reality to help people develop more empathy toward others.

Video shows how publisher 444.hu has maintained its independence in challenging circumstances using technology to develop a sustainable business model
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We’re looking for news innovators who want to challenge the status quo and take bold steps towards a more diverse and sustainable future. The European GNI Innovation Challenge is an opportunity for small and medium-sized news organizations to stimulate innovation in news.

Video reveals how a team of independent journalists in Slovakia created REMP, an open-source subscriber-based funding platform.
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How the Innovation Challenge works

The Innovation Challenge is open to established publishers, online-only players, news startups, collaborative partnerships and freelancers based in Europe. Eligible applicants should have newsrooms with fewer than 50 full-time journalists. (Publishers employing more than 50 full-time journalists can still apply and will be considered subject to Google’s discretion.) Funding is available for projects up to a maximum of €150,000. For more information on eligible projects, criteria and funding, see our website.

Apply now

We’re on the lookout for great ideas. Do you want to launch a new news product? Have a never-tested-before approach to increase quality in journalism? Or do you want to find a new way to diversify your revenue? See the Innovation Challenge website for full details about the countries, criteria and funding as well as application forms.

Applications, in English, must be made online via our website and are open until May 31, 2022 at 23:59 GMT. As part of the application process, applicants are required to produce an explanatory slide deck (please note, clicking the link opens a new page which offers a download to make your own copy of the template to work in). We will also be holding an online town hall on Wednesday, April 13 at 1pm GMT with a live presentation with the opportunity to ask questions. We’ll announce recipients later in the year.

It’s time to experiment and try something novel. Please submit your applications now.

Verifica los hechos con estas funciones de Google

En estos días, se siente como si la información viniera hacia nosotros desde todas las direcciones. Es probable que te haya pasado antes: escuchaste brevemente una transmisión de noticias, te encontraste con un meme viral o una foto en las redes sociales, has recibido una alerta en el teléfono o un miembro de tu familia te ha enviado un mensaje en un chat grupal, y es posible que sientas que no tienes toda la información sobre la historia.

La amplia disponibilidad de información, desde todo tipo de fuentes, es ideal para aprender nuevos hechos y perspectivas de todo el mundo. Pero también puede dificultar la tarea de determinar qué información es creíble y cuál no.

A principios de esta semana, Sundar anunció que Google está invirtiendo 10 millones de dólares para ayudar a combatir la desinformación sobre las realidades y los hechos de la guerra en Ucrania. Esto incluye nuevas asociaciones con grupos de estudio y organizaciones de la sociedad civil para llevar a cabo investigaciones específicas de la región sobre desinformación y apoyos en efectivo para dar soporte a organizaciones sin fines de lucro y redes de verificación de hechos.

El Día internacional de la verificación de hechos (2 de abril) es un buen recordatorio sobre el valor esencial de la verificación en este complicado panorama de información. Para hacer esto de manera eficiente, es útil tener herramientas fáciles de usar para verificar las fuentes, obtener un contexto valioso y evaluar la información. Estas son cuatro formas en las que puedes usar Google para ayudarte:

Consejos para evaluar la información, directamente en la Búsqueda

A veces, cuando las noticias son recientes o un nuevo tema es tendencia, la información que estás buscando aún no está ampliamente disponible. En estos momentos, la Búsqueda muestra automáticamente un aviso en los resultados de búsqueda que indica que puede tomar tiempo para que una serie de fuentes publiquen información sobre un tema. Estos avisos están disponibles actualmente en más de 20 idiomas alrededor del mundo.

A partir de hoy, en las búsquedas en inglés en los Estados Unidos, estos avisos también incluirán consejos para ayudarte a evaluar la información en línea, recordándote que puedes verificar si una fuente es confiable o no sobre un tema o volver más tarde cuando haya más información disponible.

También puedes consultar nuestra nueva página de recursos con indicadores para ayudarte a navegar por la información que encuentras en línea, con base en la investigación de expertos en alfabetización informativa. Aquí, puedes encontrar recordatorios útiles para cuando encuentres nueva información, como buscar sobre el autor de un contenido para tener una idea de su credibilidad, o verificar la fecha de publicación para asegurarte de que sigue siendo relevante.

Este GIF muestra un ejemplo de cómo aparecerán los nuevos tips de alfabetización informativa para las historias que evolucionan rápidamente. Para la búsqueda “OVNI filmado por un piloto de avión”, el GIF muestra una notificación para indicar que el resultado está cambiando rápidamente, así como un consejo de alfabetización informativa sugiriendo que verifiques la fuente y que regresas más tarde para ver si hay más información disponible.

Un ejemplo de los nuevos consejos y notificaciones sobre alfabetización informativa para las historias que evolucionan rápidamente

Una nueva etiqueta para las fuentes ampliamente citadas

Una organización de noticias local revela una historia de investigación que indaga sobre los problemas en el distrito escolar local. La historia es tan grande que es citada por muchos otros medios de comunicación. Pero, ¿y si no viste esa historia original, que tenía un contexto único para los residentes locales? Estamos presentando una forma de ayudarte a identificar historias que han sido citadas con frecuencia por otras organizaciones de noticias, dándote una manera sencilla de encontrar la información más útil o relevante para una noticia.

Esta etiqueta aparecerá para las historias principales. Podrás encontrarla en cualquier formato de contenido, desde un artículo de investigación, una entrevista, declaración, un comunicado de prensa o una noticia local, siempre y cuando otros editores indiquen su relevancia al enlazarla en su pieza de contenido. Estamos particularmente entusiasmados con destacar la información original, haciendo que sea aún más fácil para las personas descubrir e interactuar con los editores y los periodistas cuyo trabajo aporte un valor único a la historia.

La etiqueta para el contenido ampliamente citado se lanzará pronto en dispositivos móviles en inglés para los Estados Unidos y estará disponible a nivel mundial en las próximas semanas.

Este GIF muestra un ejemplo de cómo puede aparecer la etiqueta de “ampliamente citado” en las historias principales. Muestra una historia sobre la Major League Baseball del Tampa Bay Times con la etiqueta, con historias de ESPN y otras organizaciones de noticias en la parte inferior.

Un ejemplo de cómo pudiera aparecer la función de “ampliamente citado” en las historias principales.

Verificación de datos por parte de organizaciones independientes de verificación de hechos

Las funciones de verificación de hechos en Google son otra forma de encontrar fácilmente información que ha sido verificada por organizaciones independientes de verificación de hechos. Cuando buscas un tema que puede ser disputado, es posible que veas artículos de verificación de hechos en tus resultados. Estos resultados muestran fragmentos para ayudarte a obtener contexto acerca de una afirmación. Además, cuando navegas por Google Noticias en el escritorio, puedes ver las afirmaciones recientemente verificadas por los editores independientes en tu región, cuando se relacionan con las principales historias del día.

¿Busca verificar un tema o historia específica de la que escuchaste hablar? El Fact Check Explorer de Google te permite buscar diferentes temas sobre los que tienes preguntas. Esta herramienta recopila más de 150.000 verificaciones de hechos de editores de renombre alrededor del mundo.

Este GIF muestra un ejemplo de una búsqueda que puedes hacer en Fact Check Explorer. En este ejemplo, una persona busca la frase “bird fire” (ave de fuego) y obtiene resultados con verificación de hechos para esa afirmación.

Un ejemplo de una búsqueda que puedes hacer en Fact Check Explorer

Obtén más información sobre cualquier página en línea

A todos nos ha pasado esto antes: estás buscando en línea y te encuentras con una historia de un sitio web del que no habías oído antes. En estas situaciones, es útil verificar la fuente; por ejemplo, si estás buscando información sobre una nueva opción de inversión popular, debes asegurarte de seguir los consejos de una fuente con experiencia en finanzas. Es fácil verificar la fuente directamente en la Búsqueda, con “Acerca de este resultado.”

Este GIF muestra un ejemplo de cómo puedes usar “Acerca de este resultado” para saber más sobre una fuente o tema. Muestra a una persona haciendo clic en el panel “Acerca de este resultado” en el resultados de una búsqueda sobre inversión en NFTs, y muestra información acerca de la fuente del resultados e información de otras fuentes sobre el tema.

Un ejemplo de cómo puedes usar “Acerca de este resultado” para saber más sobre la fuente y el tema.

Cuando toques los tres puntos de cualquier resultado de búsqueda, haz clic en el enlace "Más información sobre esta página" para:

  • Conocer más sobre la fuente para tener una idea de cómo se describen a sí mismos, en sus propias palabras
  • Aprender lo que otros en la web han dicho sobre un sitio, para obtener una segunda mirada
  • Conocer el contexto adicional sobre el tema, como la cobertura de noticias más importante, para ver lo que una variedad de fuentes tienen que decir.

Estas funciones estarán disponibles muy pronto para todas las búsquedas en inglés en todo el mundo.

Apoyando a los verificadores de hechos en el mundo

También estamos apoyando una serie de nuevos esfuerzos para reforzar la verificación de hechos a nivel mundial a través de Google News Initiative. Nos estamos asociando con la Red Internacional de Verificación de Hechos (IFCN) en el Instituto Poynter sin fines de lucro para proporcionar capacitación y recursos a verificadores de hechos y expertos de la industria alrededor del mundo. El IFCN establecerá un programa para fomentar la colaboración en temas emergentes, apoyar a los verificadores de hechos contra el acoso y organizar una serie de talleres sobre herramientas y técnicas digitales. También se brindará apoyo para ayudar a los participantes de comunidades subrepresentadas a asistir al evento "Global Fact 9" que se celebrará en Oslo a finales de este año.

Además, nos asociamos con una serie de otras organizaciones de verificación de hechos:

  • Chequeado y Maldita en los Estados Unidos para ayudar a lanzar FactChequeado, una iniciativa para identificar nuevas formas de combatir la desinformación en las comunidades latinas en este país.
  • LatamChequea en América Latina para capacitar a 500 nuevos verificadores de hechos en Argentina, Colombia, México y Perú.
  • Comprova, en Brasil, la mayor coalición de verificación de hechos en el país que se centra en las elecciones presidenciales
  • Agence-France Presse para crear “Objectif désinfox”, una coalición de más de 20 redacciones comprometidas con la verificación de hechos colaborativa de la campaña presidencial francesa de abril de 2022.
  • Australian Associated Press (AAP) traducirá verificaciones de hechos a 40 publicaciones cultural y lingüísticamente diversas.
  • #FactsFirstPH, una coalición de más de 100 grupos diferentes en Filipinas para desmentir la desinformación antes de las elecciones de mayo en el país.

Estamos comprometidos a ayudar a las personas a detectar información errónea en línea y apoyar el ecosistema de verificación de hechos a largo plazo y esperamos que los anuncios y consejos de hoy permitan a las personas sentirse más seguras al explorar la información en línea.

Para obtener más consejos y mejores prácticas, consulta los recursos reunidos por la Red Internacional de Verificación de Hechos en factcheckingday.com. Y si eres periodista, echa un vistazo al Centro de Formación de GNI.

Check the facts with these Google features

These days, it can feel like information is coming at us from every direction. It’s probably happened to you before: You caught a few minutes of a news broadcast, came across a viral meme or photo on social media, got a push alert or a family member messaged you in a group chat — and you may not feel like you got the whole story.

The widespread availability of information – from all different kinds of sources – is great for learning new facts and perspectives from around the world. But it can also make it difficult to sort out what information is credible and what isn’t.

Earlier this week, Sundar announced Google is investing $10 million to help fight misinformation about the realities and facts of the war in Ukraine. This includes new partnerships with think tanks and civil society organizations to conduct region-specific research into misinformation and disinformation and cash grants to support fact-checking networks and nonprofits.

International Fact-Checking Day on April 2 is a good reminder of the essential value of fact checking in this complicated information landscape. To do this efficiently, it’s helpful to have easy-to-use tools to check sources, get valuable context, and evaluate information. Here are four ways you can use Google to help:

Tips for evaluating information, right on Search

Sometimes when news is breaking or a new topic is trending, the information you're searching for isn't broadly available yet. In these moments, Search automatically shows a notice on your search results indicating that it can take time for a range of sources to publish information on a topic. These notices are currently available in more than 20 languages around the world.

Starting today, on searches in English in the U.S., these notices will also include tips to help you evaluate information online – reminding you that you can check whether a source is trusted on a topic, or come back later when there’s more information available. You can also check out our new resource page with pointers to help you navigate the information you’re finding online, based on research from information literacy experts. Here, you can find helpful reminders for when you come across new information, like searching about the author of a piece of content to get a sense of their credibility, or checking the publication date to make sure it’s still relevant.

This GIF shows an example of how the new information literacy tips will appear on notices for rapidly evolving topics. For the query “UFO filmed by airline pilot,” the GIF shows a notice that results are changing quickly and information literacy tips suggesting that you can check the source or come back later when more information is available.

An example of new information literacy tips on notices for rapidly evolving situations.

A new label for highly cited sources

Let’s say a local news organization breaks an investigative story looking into problems at your local school district. The story is so big that it gets picked up by numerous other media outlets. But what if you didn’t see that original story, which had unique context for local residents? We’re introducing a way to help you identify stories that have been frequently cited by other news organizations, giving you a simple way to find the most helpful or relevant information for a news story.

This label will appear on Top Stories. You will be able to find it on anything from an investigative article, to an interview, an announcement, a press release or a local news story, as long as other publishers indicate its relevance by linking to it. We’re particularly interested in the potential to elevate original reporting, making it even easier for people to discover and engage with the publishers and journalists whose work brings unique value to a story.

The highly cited label is launching soon on mobile in English for the U.S. and will roll out globally in the coming weeks.

This GIF shows an example of how the new “highly cited” label can appear in Top Stories. It shows a story about Major League Baseball from the Tampa Bay Times with the label, with stories from ESPN and other news organizations below.

An example of how the “highly cited” feature could appear in Top Stories

Fact checks from independent fact-checking organizations

Fact check features on Google are another way to easily find information that has been verified by independent fact-checking organizations. When you search for a topic that may be disputed, you might see fact-check articles in your results. These results display snippets to help you get context about a claim that was made. Additionally, when you browse Google News on desktop, you can see recently fact-checked claims from independent publishers in your region, when related to the top stories of the day.

Looking to fact check a specific topic or story you heard about? Google’s Fact Check Explorer lets you search different topics you have questions about. This tool collects more than 150,000 fact checks from reputable publishers from around the world.

This GIF shows an example of a search you can do in Fact Check Explorer. In this example a person searches for the phrase “bird fire” and gets results fact checking that claim.

An example of a search you can do in Fact Check Explorer.

Learn more about any page online

We’ve all had this happen before: You’re looking online and come across a story from a website you haven’t heard of before. In these situations, it’s helpful to check the source – for example, if you’re looking for information about a popular new investment option, you want to make sure you follow advice from a source with expertise on finance. It’s easy to check the source right on Search, with About This Result.

This GIF shows an example of how you can use About This Result to learn more about a source and topic. It shows a person clicking on the About This Result panel for a result on a search about investing in NFTs, and shows information about the source of the result and information from other sources about the topic.

An example of how you can use About This Result to learn more about a source and topic.

When you tap the three dots on any search result, click the “more about this page” link to:

  • Learn about the source to get a sense of how they describe themselves, in their own words
  • Learn what others on the web have said about a site, to get a second look
  • Learn additional context about the topic, like top news coverage, to see what a range of sources have to say.

These features will be available soon for all English-language searches worldwide.

Supporting fact checkers globally

We are also supporting a number of new efforts to bolster fact checking globally through the Google News Initiative. We are partnering with the International Fact Checking Network (IFCN) at the nonprofit Poynter Institute to provide training and resources to fact-checkers and industry experts around the world. The IFCN will establish a program to foster collaboration on emerging topics, support fact-checkers against harassment and host a series of workshops on digital tools and techniques. Support will also be given to help participants from underrepresented communities attend the Global Fact 9 event being held in Oslo later this year.

Additionally, we are partnering with a number of other fact-check organizations:

  • Chequeado and Maldita in the United States to help launch FactChequeado, an initiative to identify new ways to fight misinformation in Latino communities.
  • LatamChequea in Latin America to train 500 new fact-checkers in Argentina, Colombia, Mexico and Peru.
  • Comprova, in Brazil, the largest fact-checking coalition in the country that are focused on the presidential elections
  • Agence-France Presse to create “Objectif désinfox,” a coalition of more than 20 newsrooms engaged in collaborative fact-checking the April 2022 French Presidential campaign.
  • Australian Associated Press (AAP) to translate fact checks to 40 culturally and linguistically diverse publications.
  • #FactsFirstPH, a coalition of more than 100 different groups in the Philippines to debunk disinformation ahead of the country’s May election.

We’re committed to helping people spot misinformation online and to supporting the fact-checking ecosystem for the long term and hope today’s announcements and tips help people feel more confident about navigating information online.

For more tips and best practices, check out the resources put together by the International Fact-Checking Network at factcheckingday.com. And if you’re a journalist, check out the GNI Training Center.

Stay-at-home mom or fact-checker? She’s both!

Back in 2017, Niken Satyawati’s day was filled with the business of running her household — caring for her three daughters, preparing meals, and the many other tasks any stay-at-home mom would know all too well. But in May of that year, Niken traveled from her hometown of Surakarta to Google’s office in Jakarta, where she attended a training session to learn the skills she needed to become a fact-checker.

“I saw many hoaxes on the internet. It affects real life. Friendships are broken, fighting between families,” Satyawati said. “Someone must do something to reduce them.”

So she decided to take matters into her own hands, joining a group of citizen fact-checkers who were gathering in online forums to fight misinformation. They called themselves Masyarakat Anti Fitnah Indonesia, the Indonesian Anti-Slander Society, or Mafindo for short.

A co-founder of Mafindo — Septiaji Eko Nugroho — was recruiting volunteers to join this verification training in Jakarta. Niken joined a motley crew of programmers, journalists, drivers, doctors and housewives to learn about search operators, reverse image search, video metadata, geolocation and other tools used by professional fact-checkers.

“I thought it was a great opportunity to learn about how to find the truth, thanks to tools I didn’t know existed, by hearing from people who used them all the time,” she said.

Since then, Mafindo has grown — building a professional fact-checking team that, along with the citizen fact-checkers, has debunked more than 8,550 hoaxes. They’ve trained more than 1,200 volunteers like Niken, organized anti-hoax festivals and delivered media literacy programs around the country, reaching nearly 1,000,000 Indonesians. To reach housewives, they created a web series about an anti-hoax family.

“I’m not a professional, full-time fact-checker, but I can do simple fact-checking and have gotten used to educating the general public at the family level,” Niken said.

But her modesty belies her role in Mafindo. She is on Mafindo’s presidium, or leadership committee, and is a leading figure for the organization in Central Java. She coordinated a ‘train the trainers’ program for media literacy program Tular Nalar that has reached 1400 lecturers and 6000 teachers over the past two years, and manages a weekly radio broadcast on anti-hoax issues in Surakarta.

To people interested in joining her and becoming a volunteer fact-checker themselves, her message is simple: “Every fact checker must have commitment. Commitment to integrity, and to making a better life for others by reducing the hoaxes around us. Expertise is certainly required, but can be learned. And don’t forget to share your expertise, so there will be many fact checkers in the world.”

For Indonesians who want to learn more about fact-checking — and become volunteers — Mafindo will be offering many more opportunities as it celebrates its fifth anniversary. Late last year, Google.org supported Mafindo and the MAARIF Institute with an $800,000 grant, so the two organizations can reach another 26,000 lecturers, teachers and students.

As we celebrate International Fact-Checking Day this Saturday, all of us can emulate Niken by learning more about how to identify misinformation online. We’ve compiled a list of five tips to help anyone read the news like a fact-checker — and we look forward to supporting many more people like Niken as they tackle misinformation and protect their communities.