A. Reporter's Guidelines for Fact-Checked Journalism

Editorial fact-checking is a collaborative process involving the reporter, the sources cited in their story, the editor, the fact checker, the head of research, the copy editor, and the rest of a publication's editorial team. The goal of fact-checking is not to poke holes in a story but rather to strengthen it so that it stands up to scrutiny and cannot be objected to on factual grounds. Fact-checking ensures fair and accurate storytelling, and it maintains the credibility of everyone involved in producing a work of journalism.

As a reporter, you are expected to assist fact checkers throughout their work on your story, and this means you must be aware of a publication's fact-checking standards and expectations before you begin reporting. Reading these guidelines will help you ensure that the fact-checking process goes as smoothly as possible.

To prepare a work of journalism for fact-checking, you will first need to understand how to create content (written or otherwise) with explicit consideration of its factuality. That includes knowing how to properly cite official documents and statistics, how to identify and engage with subject-matter experts and authoritative sources, how to navigate different forms of knowledge, and how to write fact-based opinion and memoir. It also includes knowing how to report ethically, including engaging in trauma-informed interview practices. Finally, it also includes knowing how to present your reported story such that others will be able to identify the sources and appreciate the credibility of the facts it contains. If you can do all of these things, you are ready to create a work of fact-checked journalism (and your fact checker will be grateful!).

We begin these guidelines by describing the reporter's role in fact checking. Then we go through each step of the fact-checking process that is relevant to the reporter, including preparation, the handover from reporter to fact checker, and the fact-checking itself.

The Reporter's Role

We think of fact-checking as an independent editorial process that takes place after a story has been reported and edited but before it is published. As the Two-Layer Principle suggests, the fact checker and reporter should be two different people operating independently in the same editorial team. Sometimes there is no institutional fact-checking support, and you, the reporter, may have to fact-check your own story. In these cases, you should try to keep fact-checking as separate as possible from reporting.

As the reporter, you are the first person responsible for your story's accuracy and integrity; your handling editor (if you are working with an editor) will help and guide you along the way. To that end, you should be thinking about fact-checking well before editorial work on your story begins. Keep track of the sources you used to inform the story; you will need to account for every fact included in it when you submit your near-final draft.

The fact checker, on the other hand, steps in only once your work with the handling editor is near complete: they review your work to ensure that it meets the publication's standards of accuracy. The fact checker does not report new information; their job is to factually deconstruct a story and build it back up stronger than it was before. They are therefore not responsible for rewriting or editing your story, nor for making decisions about sourcing, wording, or structure that you have not yet considered yourself. (For a detailed explanation of editorial roles, see Editorial Roles in Chapter Two.)

A Reporter's Responsibilities Before Fact-Checking

• Provide evidence for your claims and opinions. It's your responsibility—not the fact checker's—to ensure that you have reported an accurate story.

• Ensure the validity of your arguments. You must consider all sides of an issue, keeping in mind the reliability and integrity of your sources, and arrive at a reasonable conclusion based on the available evidence.

• Practice responsible journalism. During your reporting, you are responsible for reaching out to every person involved in a story—even if you don't plan on quoting them—to give them the opportunity to comment on information relevant to them. Keep evidence of your having done so.

• Pick the right sources. You are also responsible for making sure the sources you have used are inclusive, appropriate, and representative of the subjects and/or community they claim to be part of.

• Ensure informed consent. You must be well versed enough in the publication's fact-checking procedures so that you can convey fact-checking expectations to the sources you interview. (More on this in the following section.)

The rest of these guidelines will elaborate on the responsibilities outlined above as they show up in different parts of the fact-checking process.

Before Fact-Checking: Reporting and Editing

This section will give an overview of the reporting considerations that pertain to the fact-checking process. It will not provide instructions on how to report a story or how to choose which story to report in the first place and in what medium—that's not within the purview of this guide. But the fact-checking mindset—defined by the values of accuracy, transparency, and integrity—can certainly help structure your reporting methodology.

1. Sourcing

   As far as possible, rely on authoritative sources. It is your responsibility to assess the authority of the sources you use in the course of your reporting. Most of the time, authoritative sources include:

   • People on their own experiences and identities (including autobiographies)

   • First-hand accounts, such as diary entries, photographs, video, audio, or witnesses of an event

   • An expert or spokesperson who represents community consensus on an issue

   • Knowledge (of any form) that has already been fact-checked or has been produced using reliable methods and with integrity

   Avoid using newspaper articles, nonscholarly books, hearsay, and other non-authoritative sources in your reporting without good reason. (If you do, be transparent about the limitations of these sources within the body of the text.) If you can't find truly authoritative sources to confirm or refute a fact (which will inevitably happen), what you can find, and the reason you can't find more, often becomes an interesting part of the story itself.

   Experts can be incredibly useful during your reporting, not just as interviewees but as guides to navigating and understanding the topic or community you're writing about. However, you first need to find the right person. We find it helpful to differentiate between subject-matter experts and community representatives (see Chapter Four). Make sure you know which kind of expert you're looking for and you would be able to explain, if asked, why the expert you have chosen is appropriate for the task at hand. Crucially, make sure you have found an expert in the specific field or community you're hoping to discuss. Just as an electrician likely can't explain to you the details of a plumbing problem, a researcher specializing in Latin American music likely cannot tell you the history of Japanese jazz, and someone studying the Wolastoqey language likely cannot provide Inuktitut spellings.

   Be aware of the merits of using different forms of knowledge (oral, printed, personal, etc.) as sources for your reporting, and think about whether these different forms can be compared and used to triangulate the information you're trying to corroborate. If you are citing an oral record of an event, for example, are there also news reports that you can look at, and do they add up? If you can't find what you're looking for in official records, are there community-based or online databases that might help you? The kind of sources you consider appropriate will change based on the fact you are hoping to find or report. For example, a press release about a new documentary is perfectly reasonable as a source for the film's release date, but it is not appropriate for reporting on potential problems during the film's production. For that, you need to speak with members of the cast and crew.

   How you report the information will also depend on the kind of sources you choose to use. If you're reporting on a community's oral history, for example, it's important that you have communicated with members of that community directly and ensure that they are comfortable with that transfer of knowledge (see Chapter Four for more details).

   When reporting on someone's lived experience, you must speak with them directly as well as look for external corroboration of their story where appropriate. We advise reading through Chapter Six of the fact-checking guide for these purposes, especially when reporting on someone's personal identity, trauma, physical and mental health, and allegations of abuse, harassment, or discrimination.

   Finally, you must ensure that the sourcing decisions you have made reflect a practice of integrity and responsible communication. You should contact any people or organizations that are somehow implicated in the story you are writing, regardless of whether they are portrayed positively or negatively.

2. Informed Consent

   It is important that you establish a relationship of informed consent with any sources you interview or people with whom you interact in the course of your reporting. This includes being transparent about your methods and intentions before any official conversation begins. An interviewed source should understand why you are speaking with them, how you are planning to use their quotes and the information they give you, what they should expect from their participation (including any dangers or discomforts that may arise from their name or story being published), and what the editorial process (including fact-checking) will look like. We recommend having a pre-interview conversation with all sources about these topics, no matter how brief.

   In general, a person can be cited on the record, on background (veiled or not for attribution), or off the record; see Chapter Three of the fact-checking guide for detailed definitions. Different reporters and sources have different understandings of what on background or off the record mean, so those words alone are not enough to establish the specifics of the relationship between you and the source; you need to set out the arrangement explicitly. Your preliminary conversation with a source should include reaching an agreement about attribution. Once you arrive at one, make sure that you have understood and recorded its terms: Can the source be named, quoted, or otherwise used in your reporting, and are there any boundaries to these conditions?

   Different publications have different policies surrounding anonymity; in general, for the sake of transparency, you should press for real names and on-the-record conversations wherever appropriate. Make sure that you have discussed the issue with your handling editor before promising a source that they will be given a fictional name or special status of any kind. As part of informed consent, any veiled source should choose their own pseudonym or identification themself—ideally, their first or middle name. When ensuring someone's anonymity, remember that simply removing their name from the story is not enough: you must remove identifying information of any sort. Any reader of the story should understand from the text which sources are veiled and why.

   Irrespective of the agreement, at least two other people at the publication should know the identity of any source you cite in your story so that the publication can assess the credibility of the information they have provided. Even if someone's identity is not meant to be published, it should not be withheld from the fact checker. It is your responsibility, as a reporter, to communicate this to the source before the interview starts and ensure that they understand what their involvement entails.

   You should always tell your interviewed sources in advance that, if they participate in your reporting, they will be expected to collaborate throughout the fact-checking process. (This is true for every kind of source except off-the-record ones, to whom no information should be attributed, so there is no reason for their names to appear in the research package.) As we note in Chapter Eight of the fact-checking guide, it is your responsibility to make sure that the interviewed sources you've included in your piece are aware of what the fact-checking process entails and that they are willing and prepared to participate in it. Establishing this early on helps to avoid confusion, unwanted surprises, or worse.

   An interviewed source should understand what fact-checking their quotes, personal stores, personal identity facts, memories, and other information will look like and be ready to collaborate with you and the fact checker to ensure the requirements are met. They should also be aware of accommodations that can be made in the process as well as what is not possible.

3. Accessibility

   Making your reporting accessible and using trauma-informed interviewing practices wherever appropriate will make your story more accurate. As a general rule, meet your sources where they are: think about the platforms and methods you are using to communicate—in person, over the phone, via email, on social media—and whether any changes to your process can make it more accessible to different sources.

   Possible accommodations include: modifying your reporting timeline to fit a source's schedule and constraints, agreeing to meet in a particular location or on a platform of the source's choosing, sending your questions (or a general outline of topics) to a source ahead of your interview, breaking your interview into several sessions, allowing a support person or other people to sit in on the interview, and deciding together what can and cannot be broached prior to the interview.

   There are a number of possible modifications to the reporting process that you might decide to make in order to accommodate sources. But it's important for you to consult with your editorial team before making any significant promises to the interviewed source about accommodations to the fact-checking or editorial processes.

   (Further discussion about possible accommodations and accessibility considerations can be found in Chapters Seven and Eight of this guide.)

4. Language

   As a reporter, you are also responsible for weaving together into a story the facts you have reported. The language you choose when telling this story will also have an impact on its accuracy. You should think actively about word choices and ask yourself whether what you have written conveys the facts you mean to convey while also representing the people or communities you mean to represent.

   Make sure that you report on numbers and statistics accurately, place scientific findings in context, and use appropriate technical language. You should research jargon you don't understand and make sure it means what you (and your sources) think it means.

   Preserving the language someone uses to describe their experience is often crucial to ensuring the piece's accuracy. In general, you should respect people's and communities' language-use preferences, make sure to refer to community style guides where they exist, and ask sources directly about their preferred spellings of contested terms. Always ask sources for their pronouns and, when discussing identity, ask open-ended questions about the way they describe themselves. For example, instead of asking "Do you identify as ___?", you might ask "What words do you use to describe your sexual orientation?" or "How do you describe your racial identity?" In this way, you can ensure the language you use in your story is correct.

   While the copy editor will edit your story before it is published, you should nevertheless be aware of grammar and spelling nuances, especially for words and quotations in foreign languages and for polarizing language.

   For concrete examples of these linguistic considerations in reporting and fact-checking, refer to Chapter Five.

5. Special Consideration: Personal Writing

   Writing an opinion piece or memoir does not exempt you from fact checking. The best reporting, no matter how descriptive or narrative driven, is based on fact; you are expected to do as much research for an opinion piece as for any other and to present your sources clearly to the editor, the fact checker, and your readers.

   It should be noted that the purpose of fact-checking memoirs is not to question the reporter's memories or personal truth; the intention is to publish the story with integrity while respecting every person involved. That means making sure the version of events published is at least credibly accurate. You should be prepared to answer as many questions and provide as many sources about your experience as any other source telling a personal story would do.

   When writing a work of personal journalism, you should decide which facts to include in your story based on what you are prepared to discuss with the fact checker. The fact checker's priority will be to uphold the Personal Principle (discussed below), watch out for any legal sensitivities, and protect you from any serious inaccuracies. To this end, you should be aware, while writing, that you will need to provide sourcing for every external fact, as discussed below; only internal facts about you can be considered "on author." This may affect what kind of sensitive information you include in your piece.

   If you wish for your memoir to be fact-checked in a way different from the norm, due to the sensitive nature of the subject matter, consult with the editorial team as early as possible. The fact checker may be allowed to make certain accommodations, including allowing you, as the reporter, to participate more actively in the fact-checking process, but these considerations should all be agreed on ahead of time.

Handing Over Your Story to the Fact Checker

After you have submitted a story and your editor has signed off on it, you are ready to hand it over to the fact checker. This handover is comprised of two elements: first, compiling your research package and, second, meeting with the editorial team to discuss any necessary details.

1. The Research Package

   Fact-checking of your story can begin only once you have given the fact checker a research package that includes all of the source material you used in your reporting. As mentioned earlier, you are expected to keep track of and compile your sources throughout reporting and production for this reason.

   Your research package will include:

   • An annotated draft, where each statement in the piece is attributed to a source, against which the fact checker can verify it. You should cite at least one authoritative source source or several independent nonauthoritative sources for each discrete fact and be transparent about how you conducted your research. Ideally, these citations should appear as footnotes in your annotated draft. (Review comments in documents are easily misplaced and can be mixed up with the fact checker's and editor's comments later on.)

     If, for example, you wrote in your story, The United Nations came into being on October 24, 1945, a footnote should be inserted at the end of this statement to inform the checker where they can find the source for this particular fact (either as a hyperlink, contact information for a source, or a reference to a document in your research package). Please be as specific as you can—including the relevant page or chapter number for a book is more useful than simply mentioning the title of the book in which the fact appears.

   • Contact information for all interviewed sources (including sources on background, veiled, or not-for-attribution). You should note any pertinent information about your relationship with the sources and any sensitivities or necessary accommodations for their participation in fact-checking. Note whether a source is prone to long bouts of travel and thus may be difficult to contact, for example. Fact checkers can use this information to plan the way they approach sources accordingly.

     You should also include information about any sources you reached out to but did not hear back from. Also note the names of people you think the fact checker shouldn't reach out to and sources you decided not to refer to, and why, so that the fact checker has context for the story and can come to their own decision on the matter. They're unlikely to reach out to someone they know has already voiced a desire not to participate, for example, in which case you would need to include evidence of that source's refusal.

   • Any notes, transcripts, and recordings of your conversations with sources (including via email and other messaging platforms).

   • Documents, web pages, news clippings, scans of book pages, screenshots of social media posts, pictures, audio recordings, and any other documentary sources used in the story. To avoid losing access to these sources, we advise saving "hard" digital versions (such as PDFs) of any web page that is likely to be modified or deleted.

   By this point, you should have already communicated with sources and ensured informed consent—they should not be surprised to hear from the fact checker at any time after you have submitted your annotated draft and research package. If it has been a long time since your interview with a source, it may be worth getting back in touch with them to let them know that your story is going into fact-checking and to reiterate the expectations of the publication.

   You can cite a fact as on author (meaning it needs no sourcing) only if you consider yourself to be an authoritative source for the particular fact. This frequently happens in the context of memoirs: you are, of course, an authority on your own experience. Our general rule is that a fact can be on author in this sense only if it affects no one else—for example, if you are describing your own experience without naming anyone else or without including any checkable external facts.

2. Editorial Conversations

   When you are ready, you will send your research package to your handling editor, who will review it thoroughly and ask you to update it if any information is missing. After making the necessary revisions, you will send your research package to the fact checker.

   Before getting started, the fact checker will read through the complete package and note anything they would like to discuss with you or your editor (or head of research). Most of the time, a meeting between you and the fact checker is not necessary—all relevant information should already have been included in the research package. But, sometimes, a fact checker might reach out before starting their work in order to ask clarifying questions or make sourcing requests. Remember that you are responsible for noting in your research package all sources who might require special care during the fact-checking process.

   During a preliminary meeting, if it does occur, the fact checker will likely ask you about your relationship with the interviewed sources and their respective needs or sensitivities. They will confirm that your interviewed sources are aware of fact-checking, that they agreed to it in advance, and that they know (at least broadly) what it will entail. In some cases, especially if the story touches on someone's sensitive or traumatic experience, it might be appropriate for you to introduce the fact checker and the person directly in order to establish a basic level of trust and familiarity between them. This transfer of trust between reporter, source, and fact checker is crucial to any trauma-informed approach to fact-checking.

   The fact checker may also want to discuss any facts that they anticipate will be difficult to confirm and to brainstorm alternative options.

During Fact-Checking

Once the research package has been handed over and necessary conversations have occurred, you should step back and allow the fact checker to do their work.

The fact checker will not be making editorial decisions about the story, nor choosing the sources that inform the piece—their work begins only once the reporting has been done and the narrative choices have been made. But, because they have been given access to your entire body of research and asked to consult every source again, they have an opportunity to see your story from a completely fresh perspective. That means they can identify blind spots that you and your editor may have missed, and they also have the time and space to consider global and local ethical questions, including those involving sourcing and word choices.

During fact-checking, the fact checker will contact all sources to whom a fact is attributed (including sources on background or veiled)—and possibly others. They will go through all documents, links, and other consulted sources included in your research package. Usually, you won't hear from them during this time, but they might reach out if they have any questions about particular facts or sources.

Once they are satisfied that their fact check is complete, the fact checker will report back to the editor and head of research. You will get to see the story again once fact-checking is complete and corrections have been entered. At that point, if you have any questions, concerns, or suggestions for alternative corrections, you'll be able to discuss them with the team.

You can learn more about the fact-checking process in the eight chapters of this guide, but here are the principles the fact checker will abide by in the course of their work. Keeping these in mind while reporting and writing will help you make sure that your story is fact check ready.

The Two-Layer Principle: There are always two distinct steps to establishing a statement in a journalistic story: first, reporting; then, verification. This means that, during fact-checking, it's necessary to keep the boundaries between the reporter and fact checker clear. You should not try to edit or rewrite your story during the fact-checking process on the basis of the fact checker's findings, even if you do learn about potential errors and necessary corrections. Those changes will be taken care of by the handling editor once fact-checking is complete and then shown to you for review and approval.

The Independence Principle: Every fact will be checked against at least one authoritative source or, if that is not possible, several independent nonauthoritative sources. This requires the fact checker to be aware of the Internal/External Fact Distinction, which we discuss at length through the fact-checking guide.

The Authority Principle: A source is always authoritative on its internal facts but only sometimes authoritative regarding its external facts, depending on the source's relationship to those facts and how they were gathered.

The Knowledge Principle: Fact-checking, like reporting, requires one to navigate different forms of knowledge comfortably. How a fact is checked will consequently depend on the kind of fact it is and the context in which it has been reported. A checker will confirm a fact grounded in oral records, for example, by using oral verification methods.

The Personal Principle: A fact will be confirmed with every person it involves, regardless of how you originally reported it. This means that any element of a story that concerns someone other than the person telling the story will be checked with that person too—not just for factuality but also as a principle of integrity.

The Collaboration Principle: All facts need to be checked before a story can be published; there cannot be a compromise on this. But the fact checker will collaborate with a source to determine how the facts pertaining to them will be checked. This includes various accommodations to ensure the accessibility of the fact-checking process.

The Power Principle: Both you as the reporter and the fact checker who steps in after you should consider facts with care, think conscientiously about the relationships among people and communities, and treat all forms of knowledge as equally valid.