Google pledges $300m to support journalism and fight fake news

Google has stated that it will invest 300 Million dollars in helping news organization to fight fake news and grow their business. The search engine giant will also invest in new technological tools to enhance online news consumption. The firm, which some argue has taken advertising money away from newspapers, acknowledged journalism was "under pressure" in the digital age. However, it said it had a "shared mission" with the industry and wanted to support its future. The search giant said it had already tweaked its search algorithms to recognize "misinformation", but would now go further. In the past, Google itself has been criticized for promoting fake articles, for example, in 2017 claiming that the shooter who killed more than 50 people in Las Vegas was a Democrat who opposed Donald Trump. It said will now launch an initiative called Disinfo Lab, which will "use computational tools and journalistic oversight to monitor misinformation during elections". It has also launched a project called MediaWise - in partnership with Stanford University among others- to help young news readers "distinguish fact from fiction online".