Combating the Hoax Narrative: TED Lagos

Stephanie Busari’s succinct yet powerful TED talk in Lagos, serves as an urgent reminder of the power that every individual with access to the internet holds when it comes to the dissemination of news. With news moving rapidly than we ever thought imaginable, we all have a responsibility through our social media handles, blogs, etc. to ensure that we sent out accurate information and not over-sensationalize news just because we can.

Ms. Busari who works as a journalist and editor at CNN Africa, shares her first hand experience in watching how the hoax narrative played a huge part in delaying the rescue of schoolgirls in Chibok.

Snopes and Hoax Slayer are two of the top fact checking websites which can easily debunk any lingering urban legend myths. Life will be so much easier if we could make the effort to think, check, verify, and whenever possible, ask tough questions, before we share that piece of information which you think may be well-meaning but is not only inaccurate and false but has the potential to cause the sort of ripples that we do not need in our world right now.