Written by Steve Jones, Head of Professional Training, PA Media Academy
Think about your day. If you use social media regularly, you’re likely to scroll through dozens—sometimes hundreds—of posts in minutes. Many include claims designed to shock, scare, or provoke.
Most of us don’t have the time to be experts in verification, but we still instinctively ask ourselves the same basic questions:
- Is this image real or AI-generated?
- Does it actually show what it claims to show?
- Has anyone credible confirmed it?
- Who stands to benefit if I believe this?
These aren’t just newsroom questions anymore. They’ve become everyday life skills for all of us.
Taking a Step Back in Time
It wasn’t always this way. Around ten years ago, I became social media editor at PA Media, the national news agency for the UK and Ireland. My role focused on leading the verification of the fast-growing volume of material published online.
If you filmed a bus crashing into a shop window and posted it on your feed, my team’s job was to find that video, confirm it was genuine, and speak to you to find out what happened.
The news cycle during that period was relentless. In my first year alone, we covered the Manchester Arena terror attack, three further attacks in London, the Grenfell Tower fire, and the murder of MP Jo Cox — all against a backdrop of swirling misinformation during the Brexit referendum and Donald Trump’s first election campaign.
The stakes were extremely high. Every national, regional, and local newsroom depends on PA. So if we got verification wrong, the consequences spread far and fast. We weren’t just safeguarding PA’s reputation for fast, fair, and accurate reporting – we were protecting the integrity of information reaching millions of people.
The FACTS Framework: A Guide for Navigating Misinformation
To stay ahead of the challenge, our team, along with the wider newsroom, relied on a set of internal standards. These steps helped us stay calm under pressure, avoid assumptions, and make clear decisions even when information was chaotic or incomplete, as it often was.
As AI accelerates the speed and scale of misinformation, I’ve distilled those principles into a framework we now teach on the PA Media Academy digital verification course.
At its heart, verification is a disciplined process. Our method is simple, memorable, and — crucially — repeatable under pressure. We call it FACTS:
F — Find
Locate the original source of a claim or piece of content using online search tools and techniques.
A — Assess
Examine the content closely. Do the details make sense? Are there signs of manipulation? Does the poster appear credible?
C — Corroborate
Cross-check with other sources. Do authorities, witnesses, or trusted outlets confirm it? Do the images match known locations via tools like Google Street View?
T — Take Notes
Document your steps clearly. Posts can disappear, and good notes help explain your reasoning.
S — Second Opinion
Ask someone else to review your work. Everyone needs an editor, and a fresh perspective can catch crucial angles you might miss.
In the course, we walk delegates through each step, giving them the practical tools they need to verify content they encounter online.
Verification in the Age of AI
Of course, since 2016, the landscape has transformed dramatically. Anyone with basic tools can now produce synthetic media in seconds — deepfakes, AI-generated imagery, fabricated audio. The volume, speed, and sophistication of misinformation have surged.
But nonetheless, the framework still holds. In fact, the principles are now more vital than ever. That’s why we created the digital verification masterclass at PA Media Academy: to help people navigate an information environment permanently reshaped by AI.
Inside the Training: Realistic, Hands-On, Pressure-Tested Scenarios
This isn’t a forensic science course. It’s a practical one — designed to give you verification skills you can use immediately, whether in journalism, communications, or everyday digital life.
One of the most engaging (and fun!) parts of the training is its scenario-based design. You’re placed into real-time, high-pressure situations where new details drip-feed in — just as they do on a real news desk.
You might find yourself:
· Acting as the senior journalist on a weekend shift, an influencer claims a protest group kicked a police dog
· Untangling conflicting accounts in footage of fans and stewards during a stadium incident
· Tracking a celebrity’s movements to determine whether claims linking him to an extremist group are credible
Your goal is simple: spot clues, ask the right questions, and apply freely available open-source tools to uncover the truth.
We cover practical OSINT techniques, including geolocation via Maps, Eart,h and Street View; reverse image searches; checking metadata and timestamps; verifying environmental details; and assessing sources and motives. These are no longer niche skills – they are all things any of us can do on our phones at any given moment.
Why These Skills Matter for Everyone — Not Just Journalists
While the course is built with media organisations and PR and comms teams in mind, these skills benefit anyone who spends time online.
The quality of information we consume shapes our conversations, our choices, and our understanding of the world. When more people can perform basic checks — even informally — our whole information ecosystem becomes healthier and safer.
Verification is no longer a specialist discipline. It’s a life skill.
Get in touch today to find out how your team can take part in our interactive digital verification masterclass.
About the Author
Steve Jones is the head of professional training and also delivers the Digital Verification Masterclass for newsrooms around the country. Previously, Steve was head of social media and data journalism at the Press Association, where he led a team responsible for online newsgathering and verification of user-generated content for the UK and Ireland’s national news agency.
