True or False: Studying Work Practices of Professional Fact Checkers

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Misinformation has developed into a critical societal threat that can lead to disastrous societal consequences. Although fact checking plays a key role in combating misinformation, relatively little research has empirically investigated the work practices of professional fact checkers. To address this gap, we conducted semi-structured interviews with 21 fact checkers from 19 countries. Fact checkers reported being inundated with information that needs filtering and prioritizing prior to fact checking. The interviews surfaced a pipeline of practices fragmented across disparate tools that lack integration. Importantly, fact checkers lack effective mechanisms for dissemination which prevents their efforts from fully achieving their potential impact. We found that the largely manual and labor intensive nature of current fact-checking practices is a barrier to scale. We apply these findings to propose a number of suggestions that can improve the effectiveness, efficiency, scale, and reach of fact-checking work and its outcomes.