Everything nowadays is about being viral and trending. But with this information bombardment comes a lot of fake news too! 

Especially with the pandemic hitting us and social media and other media being easily assessible to people this fake news and viral trends seem to have been reaching it's new height. 

Platforms like WhatsApp and Facebook top this, fake news and messages do rounds among people so quickly that it's hard to enlighten and dispel such false news. Older generations are the most easy to be manipulated by such viral and fake news. Fake WhatsApp messages reach the Indian masses and many believe in them.

Recently, there was news and videos of people turning magnetic after being vaccinated. And might I tell you, people around me too actually believed and were trying to stick spoon and forks on their body. Our skin being the oily self helped people strongly believe this news. So much so was this going viral that the Govt. of India actually had to out a statement that all these were fake news. 

Another very disturbing thing that happens is how some people conveniently use or crop just a part of a video, speech or photo and portray a completely different story. Thee have been numerous occasions where a certain part of people's speech has been used to falsely accuse and shame people. 

Photoshopping photos and videos is another deadly weapon that can shatter images and credibility of people. Many celebrities are linked to one another but this is hardly the truth. Morphed images and videos also propagate a lot of hate and false news.

In this time when we have so much information and news given to us, it becomes very important to know what is to be read and ignored. As audience, especially educated and literate audience it is our responsibility to identify and act to fake news. It may not always possible for us to know what is true or false. But we can at least prevent forwarding it without fact check. We mindlessly forward news and information without checking it's credibility. I have also been there, when I shared and believed everything that was on the internet.

But now I have realized that not everything on the web is the truth. Tools of manipulation, edit and great photoshopping skills can make a lot of good fake news. But as responsible netizens, we can choose better platforms and verified news sources for our information. 

Let's do our part, then!