Hoax

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A false report , also known colloquially as a " newspaper duck ", is an inaccurate news report. It arises from incorrect or negligent research by a journalist or is deliberately disseminated by journalists, government agencies , politicians , companies , private individuals and other informants . As a rule, this must be distinguished from April fools' jokes that are clearly recognizable for the recipient and other news satires . The Duden defines false reports as "a report, a message that does not correspond to the real facts, contradicts it".

Press code and press law

This article or paragraph presents the situation in Germany . Help us to describe the situation in other countries.

In the German journalistic code of honor , the obligation to be truthful and the special care to avoid false or misleading reports are generally recognized. This also includes the obligation to correct false reports, for example by publishing a correction or counter-statement in the next edition of the publication. In terms of media law , there is often a journalistic duty of care; a general prohibition of false reports with criminal penalties, on the other hand, as a rule, just as there is no law against the expression of untruths outside the press. Crimes that violate the principle of truthfulness (such as defamation or fraud ) are also prohibited in the mass media . As soon as a false report has been recognized as such, news agencies issue a breaking report with clarifying or corrective content.

Right to rectification

Against false reports, there is a civil right to a correction against the publication that distributed the inaccurate report. The claim is made by the person (person, company, party, association, body, etc.) who is affected by the demonstrably false report and who is thereby continuously violated in his personal rights. Regardless of the truthfulness of the allegations, everyone has the right to reply . The reply also appears in the relevant press, but has to be written by the person concerned and therefore only has the character of a statement in the public eye. Newspapers, for example, sometimes supplement them by saying that they are sticking to their own presentation of the facts, which would not be possible if corrected. The counter-notification must, however, be placed in the same place in the publication as the false report and in the appropriate size (false report was on the title page , so the counter- notification must also be on the title page).

In the Anglo-Saxon region in particular, much smaller offenses and careless mistakes are corrected. In the New York Times, the correction column is said to be one of the most widely read texts in the newspaper. The Swiss Ringier publishing house also introduced a so-called “fairness” section, in which, after controversial research, an opposing position is presented. Critics like the media scientist Michael Haller, on the other hand, criticize the German Press Council for being opaque and a "toothless tiger".

Emergency ordinance and restriction of the freedom of the press

In Germany, during the Weimar Republic, emergency ordinances enabled various countermeasures against false reports: In 1931 alone, 516 newspaper bans were issued on the basis of the republic protection laws and 379 by means of emergency ordinances. This particularly affected media that called for disobedience to existing laws, but also those in which organs, institutions, authorities or senior officials of the state were attacked by means of false statements. After Hitler came to power on February 4, 1933, the decree of the Reich President for the protection of the German people came into force. Among other things, this not only eliminated the basic right to freedom of expression and freedom of the press, but also explicitly prohibited the distribution of "incorrect news". What was right and what was wrong will in future be determined by the Reich Ministry for Public Enlightenment and Propaganda .

"Fake News"

As " Fake News " (also fake news or Fakenews ; fake news ) are usually intentionally spread or published false reports referred to are mainly on the Internet, especially in social networks and other social media part " viral also" spread and sometimes be picked up by journalists. In early 2017, the term became Anglicism of 2016.

See also

literature

  • Hans Hollstein: Newspaper ducks. Little story of the hoax. Cheerful and serious varieties from April Fool's Day to disinformation. Stuttgart, 1991. ISBN 3-927763-02-0

Web links

Wiktionary: False report  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations
Wiktionary: Fake News  - Explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ False report . duden.de; accessed on December 28, 2016
  2. ↑ How much is a complaint worth? Tagesspiegel, March 13, 2004
  3. ↑ Manfred Pohl: The struggle for the independence of the newspaper publisher under the Nazi dictatorship. Campus Verlag, 2009, pp. 192–193.
  4. ↑ Tobias Jaecker: Journalism in the Third Reich . Free University of Berlin, Friedrich Meinecke Institute for History, 2000, p. 3 f.
  5. ↑ see rules: § 37 (E4), § 55 (3), § 45 (E1), Fake News. In: Digital dictionary of the German language . Retrieved February 16, 2017
  6. ↑ Anglicism of the year 2016 . responsible in terms of press law: Anatol Stefanowitsch , accessed on February 8, 2017