Is Verification the new Trust currency?

The rise of algorithmically driven information, coupled with the volume and sophistication of AI-generated content, has intensified epistemic insecurity, further eroding public trust and increasing susceptibility to misinformation and conspiracy narratives. Technical standards and frameworks such as the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA), the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI), and the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) provide structured approaches for verifying content authenticity, while inclusive and culturally aware practices can ensure that verification is globally relevant and ethically responsible.

Addressing these challenges increasingly involves embedding verification as a core skill in newsroom practice and journalism curricula, helping journalists develop the capacity to critically evaluate, authenticate, and contextualise content across multiple formats, languages, and platforms. This review also offers an illustrative overview of global initiatives, tools, and networks working in verification, fact-checking, and content provenance, highlighting the evolving ecosystem that supports trustworthy journalism.

We are all exposed to an overwhelming amount of information, yet most people struggle to know what’s true, what’s false, and how different pieces of information fit together. It can undermine people’s ability to understand events, make sense of the world, and make informed decisions. Research shows that it’s increasingly difficult to discern truth from falsehood without robust tools, training, and guidance. In 2024, a diary study by Professors Tanya Notley and Sora Park indicated that only 3 % of Australian adults could verify information online.

For content authentication, the C2PA is the closest framework to a global technical standard for establishing media as verified. For processes, the IFCN, BBC Verify, and Reuters provide recognised verification frameworks. In terms of regulation, ISO and ETSI are developing more formal standards, but none have yet been fully implemented.

In Australia, the regulation of misinformation and disinformation is governed by the Australian Code of Practice on Disinformation and Misinformation and its compliance is managed by the DIGI’s (Digital Industry Group Inc), governed by platforms like Google, Meta, TikTok, X, which monitor the compliance and receive and investigate complaints.

A glimpse of the current state of verification and provenance

The challenges around verification are not new to the industry. Standards and systems have been discussed for years to address verification challenges. For example, in 2019, the Verification Handbook made a significant contribution, especially for emergency coverage, and the Verification Handbook for Investigative Reporting has provided guidance for journalists, including the use of user-generated content.

The impact of verification standards and workflows will be most visible when these solutions are fully embedded in everyday journalistic practice, helping newsrooms meet expected standards of authenticity.

And while there’s no single global definition for what counts as verified audio, video, or text, media organisations are developing policies and internal standards. The AAP FactCheck (Australian Associated Press) is accredited by the International Fact‑Checking Network (IFCN) and follows the IFCN’s Code of Principles, while ABC Verify investigates, traces, and debunks misinformation online and in the media, conducting investigations using open-source visual tools, user-generated content, geolocation, social media, and data.

The Poynter’s International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN) maintains a global Code of Principles for verified information, and BBC Verify defines internal newsroom verification standards for video forensics, geolocation, metadata analysis, and source validation. Reuters Fact Check maintains proprietary verification frameworks, which primarily define process standards rather than file-level verification.

Some newsrooms are adhering to established standards, such as the C2PA standards for digital provenance, the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) for authenticity indicators, the IFCN Code of Principles for fact-checking integrity, BBC Verify standards for Open Source Intelligence (OSINT) and multimedia analysis, and Reuters Forensic Methods for image and video forensic benchmarks.

Meeting increasing authenticity expectations is a challenge requires a shift in media culture. Within newsrooms, content verification together with critical and analytical thinking will become core skills within journalism competencies, rather than a specialised function for dedicated debunking teams or investigative journalists. Verification has already evolved into a technically complex and evidence-driven specialisation. Journalists first identify the source of the content and assess the credibility of the account that posted it. This is followed by establishing provenance: examining the file’s metadata, with the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA) playing a key role in helping verify the origin, edits, and authorship of digital content. Cross-checking visual details against satellite imagery, weather data, and other contextual clues facilitates time and location verification. Media forensic analysis looks for signs of manipulation, using frame-by-frame video analysis, compression artifact inspection, or audio spectrogram examination. Fact-checking then evaluates whether the claims contained in the authenticated content are true/accurate.

Verification + Fact-Checking in journalism curricula

Addressing epistemic insecurity will require university curricula to treat verification as a distinct, explicitly taught skill in journalism programs, separate from fact-checking, and supported through dedicated tools. Verification is likely to become a foundational competency for all journalism students, ensuring they can critically evaluate and authenticate information across multiple media formats, languages, and digital platforms.

Many journalism students still receive little structured training in authenticating content because verification is often treated as a niche skill in journalism programs, limited primarily to fact-checking or investigative modules.

Being able to critically judge online content will increasingly become an essential journalistic skill as digital literacy continues to evolve. According to a 2024 UNESCO survey, 62% of respondents do not carry out rigorous and systematic verification of information before sharing it. The urgency for standards and clarification stems from a basic but critical distinction: verification asks whether content is authentic, while fact-checking asks whether its claims are true. In practice, however, this distinction is often blurred in newsrooms, and current best practices do not always effectively address both.

Integrating verification as a core journalistic competency will be critical for strengthening evidence-based reporting and helping restore audience trust in journalism. It will build professional competence, strengthen understanding of epistemic responsibility, and prepare students to address current and future challenges of misinformation in diverse, multilingual, and global contexts. In academic contexts, verification would also benefit from interdisciplinary collaboration with fields such as data science, AI, digital security, ethics, law, and policy analysis. This cross-disciplinary approach will equip the journalists of the future with verification skills that are adaptable to evolving technologies and platforms. Integrating verification as a core journalistic competency will be critical for strengthening evidence-based reporting and helping restore audience trust in journalism.