“We want to see who is making false claims, we want to see who is repeating them, and we want to be able to check things in as close to real time as possible,” Full Fact Deputy CEO Mevan Babakar explains.

Full Fact first secured DNI Funding in 2016 for a project called Fact Checking Automation and Claim Tracking System (FACTS), which supported the early beginnings of the organisation’s automated fact checking tools. The FACTS innovation was instrumental in building their current blend of claim detection (finding misinformation) and claim matching (looking for repetition of false claims made elsewhere). Fact checks are published on their own website and Full Fact automation tools are available at no cost for fact checkers around the world to sign up for.

The team is currently testing a new service in different languages, where speech recognition technology is supporting the real time scanning and checking of misleading claims. Media partners in Argentina and Africa are involved in the testing with plans to add other countries into the project in the future.