Google’s $300 million new initiative to fight fake news

California, March 21: Google has introduced a new initiative to support media industry by highlighting accurate journalism while fighting misinformation when important news breaks out and create new tools for journalists to make their jobs easier.

However, it said it had a shared mission with the industry and wanted to support its future. The search giant said it had already tweaked its search algorithms to recognise misinformation, but would now go further.

It said will now launch an initiative called Disinfo Lab, which will use computational tools and journalistic oversight to monitor misinformation during elections.

It has also launched a project called MediaWise - in partnership with Stanford University among others to help young news readers distinguish fact from fiction online.

Philipp Schindler, Google's chief business officer, said the firm was working closely with the news industry to drive sustainable growth.

Schindler said Google had launched a new initiative called Subscribe with Google, which will allow readers sign up for paid subscriptions from partner publishers with a single click.

He also promised to do more to help news portals enhance the news reading experience online, for example, with its fast loading mobile web pages.

Many print media organisations have been hit hard as journalism has moved online over the last 15 years and print circulation has dwindled.