ALEPPO, Syria — Since the outbreak of the revolution in Syria five years ago, various Arab and international media outlets naturally began publishing daily reports about the various political, military and humanitarian developments in the country. Amid the great number of news flashes and articles, the amount of incorrect, distorted and groundless information became noticeable. This gave ​​Syrian journalist Ahmad Primo the idea to launch the platform Verify. Primo spoke to Al-Monitor about the purpose of the platform — “giving the reader correct information that is free of lies and distortion.”

Primo holds a degree in programming and web development and has been working in online media for seven years. He explained that there are many reasons that lead to the spread of false information in the media. Chief among them, Primo said, “Media outlets rush to spread news about Syria. In the absence of censorship, they publish news based on the copy/paste technique without following professional standards to verify whether the news comes from official or reliable sources.”

Verify's slogan is “Responsible Journalism.” Four volunteer journalists staff the platform's management and editorial team to correct, confirm and refute news items. Each journalist works from his or her place of residence in Syria, Turkey and Germany. Eight additional journalists monitor suspicious journalistic articles and submit them to the editorial team for verification. Visitors to the platform, however, play the most important role in the monitoring process, submitting the largest percentage of corrected news items.

“We are happy that social media users are hugely interactive with us,” Primo said. Dozens of items are being sent to us on a daily basis for verification, and when the article is correct, we inform them that it is correct. But when it is wrong, we publish a correction after finding a source refuting the validity of the article.”