By J Nastranis<\/p>\n\n\n\n
NEW YORK (IDN)\u2014The United Nations has launched a strategic initiative to combat the growing scourge of COVID-19 misinformation by increasing the volume and reach of trusted, accurate information.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe cannot cede our virtual spaces to those who traffic in lies, fear and hate,\u201d said UN Secretary-General, Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, who announced the initiative called \u2018Verified\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMisinformation spreads online, in messaging apps and person to person. Its creators use savvy production and distribution methods. To counter it, scientists and institutions like the United Nations need to reach people with accurate information they can trust,\u201d the UN chief explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Verified is led by the UN Department for Global Communications (DGC). It will provide information around three themes: science \u2013 to save lives; solidarity \u2013 to promote local and global cooperation; and solutions \u2013 to advocate for support to impacted populations. It will also promote recovery packages that tackle the climate crisis and address the root causes of poverty, inequality and hunger.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The initiative is calling on people around the world to sign up to become \u201cinformation volunteers\u201d to share trusted content to keep their families and communities safe and connected. Described as digital first responders, the volunteers will receive a daily feed of verified content optimized for social sharing with simple, compelling messaging that either directly counters misinformation or fills an information void.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
DGC will partner with UN agencies and UN country teams, influencers, civil society, business and media organisations to distribute trusted, accurate content and work with social media platforms to root out hate and harmful assertions about COVID-19.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIn many countries the misinformation surging across digital channels is impeding the public health response and stirring unrest. There are disturbing efforts to exploit the crisis to advance nativism or to target minority groups, which could worsen as the strain on societies grows and the economic and social fallout kicks in,\u201d Melissa Fleming, UN Under-Secretary-General for Global Communications, said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe Verified initiative will also work to address this trend with hopeful content that celebrates local acts of humanity, the contributions of refugees and migrants, and makes the case for global cooperation,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The initiative is a collaboration with Purpose<\/em>, one of the world\u2019s leading social mobilization organizations. It is supported by the IKEA Foundation<\/em> and Luminate<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Patricia Atkinson, the IKEA Foundation\u2019s Chief Programmes Officer, said: \u201cThe COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented global health crisis. The IKEA Foundation is proud to be supporting Verified \u2013 an initiative aiming to make sure everyone has access to the trusted science and advice they need to keep their family and loved ones safe.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n Nishant Lalwani, Managing Director of Luminate, added: \u201cCOVID-19 has provided a stark reminder that access to accurate, trusted information can be the difference between fear and resilience, division and unity, and even life and death. We are proud to be supporting Verified and its work to tackle the coronavirus \u2018infodemic\u2019 by rapidly spreading reliable, science-based information to protect people and communities around the world.\u201d [IDN-InDepthNews \u2013 21 May 2020]<\/p>\n\n\n\n Image credit: La Voice di New York<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" By J Nastranis NEW YORK (IDN)\u2014The United Nations has launched a strategic initiative to combat the growing scourge of COVID-19 misinformation by increasing the volume and reach of trusted, accurate information. \u201cWe cannot cede our virtual spaces to those who traffic in lies, fear and hate,\u201d said UN Secretary-General, Ant\u00f3nio Guterres, who announced the initiative […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":5948,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40,23,16,32],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-5947","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-global-regions","8":"category-media-communication","9":"category-news","10":"category-regions"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5947","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5947"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5947\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5949,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5947\/revisions\/5949"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5948"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5947"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5947"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/inpsjapan.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5947"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}