New York Times has accepted that they are currently working on a project that requires blockchain technology to fight against fake news.
As reported on Tuesday, the latest website for the publisher's News Provenance Project states that the newspaper's Research and Development team plans to team up with the IBM Garage (an accelerator program) to use Hyperledger Fabric's permissioned blockchain to validate new images used in journalism.
The project's main goal is to fight against fake news and adulterated media, which it claims to harm small and large publishers especially. The website states, "News consumers [who] are deceived and confused…eventually become fatigued and apathetic to news."
The website reads, "Our initial work involves exploring a blockchain-based system for recording and sharing metadata about media — images and videos in particular — published by news organizations. We are also conducting user experience research to identify the types of signals that can aid users in recognizing authentic media."
The New York Times and partner firms will operate a proof-of-concept from July till the end of this year to find a way to hold trust in digital files. The project's purpose is to store a news item's "contextual metadata" on a blockchain along with when and where a photo or video was shot, who captured it and information about how it was edited and distributed.
The primary purpose is to build a set of signals which can travel with published media anywhere the material is displayed along with social media, group chats, and search results.
This is the latest move taken by The New York Times, and along with the support of research and development teams besides NYT journalists, they demand they want to share their results publically. New York Times states that it will not be the core recipient in the project:
"Ultimately, though, it is the audiences for news who should benefit the most. If it doesn't work for them, then it doesn't work."
More confirmation came via a tweet from Vivian Schiller, CEO of Civic Media, previously working with The New York Times. Also, Sasha Kore, the project's lead published a detailed Medium post about the project.