Only one in 5 of us trust social media reports

FEWER than one in five Britons think social media does a good job in separating fact from fiction, a major study has revealed.

That is less than half the number who think the traditional news media does well in that regard, according to a Reuters report based on a survey of 70,000 people in 38 countries.

Globally, only 24 per cent of people think social media does a good job in separating fact from fiction, but that drops to 18 per cent in the UK.

That compares to a global figure of 40 per cent who thought news media did a good job in that regard, with the UK scoring 41 per cent.

The public’s concerns about fake news should embolden publishers to champion distinctive, high-quality journalism, the report’s author Nic Newman said.

He added that media organisations should be encouraged by a finding that, contrary to what had been thought, under-35s were prepared to pay for news.

‘The worries that people have about the quality of their news means there is an opportunity to charge,’ Mr Newman said.