Negative rating of news. Analysis of top 50 Ukrainian websites.

Institute of Mass Information and “Teksty” researched newsfeed of top 50 Ukrainian news websites to understand which media outlets work fairly and which use lies, emotions manipulation, and bogus headlines. We established six criteria of non-credible news: unreliable source of information, misleading news pieces, manipulative headlines, fakes, emotions manipulation, and hate speech. We applied these criteria to the news media outlets and identified their negative rating. The top position in this negative rating is held by Russian media outlet “Konsomolskaya Paravda”. Why is it even present in our research? Because it is one of the 50 most read media outlets in Ukraine. Their Ukrainian subsidiary, “Komsomolaska pravda v Ukrayini”, is on the 10th position in the anti-rating. In the top ten, as could be foreseen, there are Russian media outlets (they are also popular in Ukraine), such as “Lenta.ru” and "Vesti.ru”. Next to them, there is a Ukrainian media outlet with openly pro-Russian  narrative, “Strana.ua”. Also, top ten of the negative rating includes Ukrainian websites, called in the circles of journalists “dump tanks” (*Translator's note: "dump tank" is a slang term for media outlets controlled by authorities or political parties used by them as a mouthpiece). Media outlets of this types can also be encountered on lower anti-rating positions. So what media are reliable enough to be read? The most professional media outlets are in the bottom of our anti-rating. It should be mentioned that we studied the news for only one week, so we cannot guarantee that the quality of media outlets is uniform all along, as various cases influenced by many factors can happen – those factors can range from current financial situation to personal qualities of the workers. Still, the tendency indicated is still quite clear: you can see which media outlets try to uphold the standards of journalism. To view the rating and description of each media outlet, click on this link. IMI, "Teksty"