A program which will take in text and return if it is misinformation, by referencing a database from Politifact. Text will be taken in from the user, and will be displayed differently according to the type of misinformation (Using politifact’s rating scale).
In our digital age of technological advancement and the creation of the internet, finding information is now easier than ever. However, the information isn’t always accurate: the number of fake news and misinformation is now higher than ever, and it’s difficult to distinguish between truth and falsity. Our project aims to help clarify that distinction, by creating an extension that could cross reference information on the internet with trusted sources.
To use the Heroku application, all you need to do is go to the URL: https://politifactmisinformation.herokuapp.com/The Heroku app consists of a simple HTML user interface, where you can input a line that you want the program to process. It includes a table/key that shows the different types of misinformation, as well as the text color associated with them. Currently, we can only check very specific lines that completely match the title of the page in Politifact. The interface has a bar where you can input the line, and upon checking the line, it prints out the line again with a hyperlink to the Politifact page, and changes the text color to match one of the six different states of misinformation (True, Mostly True, Half True, Mostly False, False, Pants On Fire!), which were taken from Politifact’s rating scale.
After clicking the Submit button for one statement, the input form is cleared and you can enter another fact to submit and check, which will print out another line of the statement below the previous statement as hyperlinked and colored.
In the case that the line is not found in the Politifact database, then it will print out a line without the colored text and without a hyperlink.
Some example statements to test:
- The USPS backdated 100K ballots so they could be counted illegally. --> This should be marked.
- Video footage from Georgia shows suitcases filled with ballots pulled from under a table and illegally counted after election observers were told to leave. Says COVID-19 has killed more North Carolinians in a year than the flu has in 10 years. ---> Both of these should be marked as different sentences.
- A Dominion representative in Gwinnett County improperly downloaded election data to “manipulate the data.” Misinformation is important! --> One should be marked, one shouldn't
- Download the github code and extract the chrome extension folder.
- In chrome's extension manager, enable developer mode.
- Then, click "Load unpacked" and navigate inside the chrome extension folder and click select folder.
- After this, make sure the extension is turned on, and open up sample.html from the same folder in chrome.
- You should be able to see the text automatically changing.