Snapshot from the AFCN Community Regional Meeting in Amman – December 2, 2023.
By ARIJ’s AFCN
The ARIJ’s AFCN’s inaugural year participating in the IDRC study (2023-2025) focused on identifying the primary drivers of information disorder in the Arab region. Given the complexity of this task, the research team adopted a qualitative approach, emphasizing interviews to gain a deep understanding of these drivers from varied perspectives. The study concentrated on ten Arab countries: Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco, Palestine, Syria, Tunisia, and Yemen, aiming to gather insights from experts, journalists, and other stakeholders. Ultimately, 124 experts contributed to this analysis.
Our analysis aimed to pinpoint commonalities and variations across countries that share certain regional dynamics yet experience unique challenges based on their distinct contexts. The findings from this first year reveal critical insights into these shared and distinct aspects of information disorder across the region.
The most recurrent theme among interviewees was the influence of political factors. Political restrictions, security challenges, and ongoing crises in the region contribute significantly to the creation and spread of misleading or harmful content, whether intentionally or unintentionally. This situation is exacerbated by the limited flow of reliable information from official sources, primarily government bodies. Many interviewees described what we termed the “silent communicator syndrome”—a practice where authoritative sources withhold information, creating a vacuum often filled by unverified or false content.
The second major driver relates to unprofessional practices within media outlets. Limited content verification before publication, coupled with a tendency to pursue agendas or business models that mimic social media, contribute to this problem. Traditional media, in some cases, adopt sensationalist approaches like those of digital platforms, which do not always adhere to journalistic standards. This unprofessionalism was identified as a significant driver of information disorder in the region.
Laws and regulations addressing disinformation represent a complex driver with varied perspectives among respondents. Some respondents viewed the lack of criminalization as problematic, while others highlighted that such laws, in many cases, negatively impact freedom of expression and press freedom. The diversity of approaches to legislation across countries underscores the nuanced relationship between regulatory practices and information disorder in the region.
The first year of the study allowed us to draw collusion to design recommendations for different stakeholders including providing clear, accurate official information to mitigating information disorder in Arab countries, while concealing or denying access intensifies the issue. Strengthening legal frameworks with balanced, non-restrictive laws is crucial, especially to avoid excessive controls that can stifle media freedom and contribute to disinformation. Additionally, empowering journalists as reliable gatekeepers, through enhanced training in ethical practices and improved access to information, is recommended to prevent professional errors that allow misinformation to spread. The study suggests promoting media literacy and critical thinking to equip the public to better identify misinformation, particularly in contexts marked by political or social conflicts.
Examining Fact-checking as a response
Building on our understanding of the drivers of information disorder, we turned our attention in the second year of the study, to the fact-checking practices that are emerging across the Arab world. As fact-checking organizations/initiatives continue to grow, AFCN’s research team has focused on understanding how these practices are evolving in the region, examining both pre-publication and post-publication fact-checking methods.
Our research in this phase relied on 2 surveys and 3 focus groups, with a particular focus on fact-checking organizations within the AFCN community across ten Arab countries. The first survey targeted fact-checkers, responses were collected from March 13 to May 5, 2024. We successfully included 77 fact-checkers in our analysis, representing 23 Arab fact-checking organizations/initiatives across ten Arab countries. We also conducted two focus groups, one in Jordan on February 9, 2024, which gathered 10 fact-checkers and 9 fact-checking organizations from 7 Arab countries. The second focus group was conducted online on March 10, 2024, with the participation of eight editors-in-chief from eight leading Arab fact-checking organizations/initiatives in seven Arab countries.
The second survey targeted journalism practitioners and took place from May 7 to June 11, 2024. The final dataset consisted of 95 media professionals, i.e., journalists, editors, editor-in-cheifs working in one of the media organizations across 10 Arab countries. We also conducted a focus group on 26 March 2024 with three participants, representing Sowt Podcast in Jordan, AlQatiba in Tunisia, and ARIJ (Pan-Arab).
Despite a largely standardized fact-checking process aimed at distinguishing information from mis- and disinformation, the organizational structures within AFCN member organizations vary widely. Many organizations rely on freelancers and volunteers for fact-checking tasks, showcasing a range of operational models designed to resource availability and organizational priorities.
During the evidence-gathering phase, fact-checkers displayed both shared practices and distinct approaches. While some emphasized the value of open-source information, others noted its limitations within the Arab context. Political accountability, interestingly, was not seen as the most effective method for addressing mis- and disinformation; instead, media literacy emerged as a promising complementary approach. Fact-checkers are experimenting with various strategies to reach audiences effectively, including the production of short videos and optimizing search engines to increase the visibility of fact-checked content.
Financial challenges represent a significant barrier to the sustainability of fact-checking initiatives in the Arab world. These constraints not only threaten the continuity of fact-checking organizations but also potentially impact on their non-partisan stance, influencing the volume and quality of fact-checked content they can produce.
In terms of pre-publication fact-checking, our analysis revealed a prevalent misconception among respondents, who often conflated fact-checking with tasks like proofreading, enforcing editorial policies, and verifying source reliability. For organizations actively implementing pre-publication fact-checking, there was notable diversity in methodologies and procedures.
Media organizations cited multiple challenges in conducting pre-publication fact-checking, including a shortage of skilled fact-checkers, limited financial resources, time constraints, and difficulties accessing reliable information.
The second year of the study highlighted the need to increase funding opportunities, such as AFCN’s assistance with grants and partnerships, are essential for operational longevity. Current efforts largely focus on debunking specific claims, there is a growing need for broader investigative reporting on disinformation trends. Political fact-checking also remains a challenge in restrictive environments, necessitating creative strategies.
Our recommendations from the second year of the study evolve around calling for enhanced understanding, awareness, and implementation of pre-publication fact-checking within media organizations. Adopting fact-checking processes tailored to newsrooms’ resources and growth strategies and implementing. Additional projects, ongoing training, and funding are essential to build qualified fact-checking capacities and ensure that pre-publication verification becomes an integral practice across the region’s media landscape.
For 2025, AFCN’s research team aims to focus more on fact-checking as a response and to get a deeper examination of content being fact-checked by fact-checkers, and its harmful potential in the Arab world.
Overall, the three years of the research projects were designed to help us first get a deeper understanding of information disorder drivers in the Arab region, which was followed by an exploration of fact-checking in the Arab region which remains understudied, to eventually evaluate the quality of post-publication fact-checking in the region.
