17 Nov
by Hazwany Jamaluddin
On November 15 in Kuala Lumpur, JomCheck formally launched Malaysia’s first academe-media-civil society fact-checking alliance online to combat misinformation ahead of the general elections. The formation of the alliance intends to address the spread of mis- and dis-information online during the election campaign. Arus Academy, the Media Education For All (ME4A) movement and the Society of Media and Information Literacy Educators (SMILE) join the alliance in support of education through empowerment to inform Malaysians as we brace ourselves for the flood of misinformation during election season.
âWhen campaigning online or offline, candidates inevitably publish a lot of self-promotion materials, share their respective manifestos, but also criticisms towards their political opponents, as part of their strategies,â said JomCheckâs secretariat chief Assoc Prof Dr Sabariah Mohamed Salleh.
JomCheck aims to unite fact-checkers in Malaysia by facilitating collaboration and communication. In addition, the alliance wants to help ease and share the workload stemming from mis and disinformation. JomCheck also hopes that the unison of effort would prevent duplication of work, unoptimised usage of resources and limited audience reach.
The alliance has provided a dedicated tip line to allow Malaysians to submit their fact-check requests to check dubious claims and obtain clarifications from a trustworthy source. Partners of JomCheck will work together to debunk the claims and provide clarification to Malaysians.
Malaysians who require fact-checking assistance on claims found on the Internet can send a WhatsApp message on JomCheck dedicated tip line at +6017 477 6659 (WhatsApp text only, no calls) or via this link https://wa.link/9ogazj.
About Jom Check
Jom Check is Malaysiaâs first and only academe-media-civil society fact-checking alliance. It is entirely independent and consists of Malaysians working in the academic and local media industry. JomCheck is supported by Google Malaysia and Google News Initiative.
Email: check@jomcheck.org
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