December 27, 2023: Media Matters for Democracy (MMfD) held a capacity-building event, titled ‘Scrapathon: Scraping Electoral Disinformation’, from 26-27 December, 2023, in Karachi.
Launched in partnership with the Embassy of France, Scrapathon was aimed at helping participants build and enhance their digital investigation skills. It was the first step towards a sustainable fact-checking tool that is being developed by MMfD. The tech-based tool would enable collective efforts among mainstream newsrooms against disinformation.
Image: MMfD
The event was attended by a variety of participants, including fresh and mid-career journalists, students, and academics. Guided by MMfD’s senior team members, the participants deployed essential techniques to scrape various forms of information disorders from the internet, including misleading and false claims and fake posts.
Image: MMfD
Participants exercised independent data collection on leading social media platforms, including YouTube, TikTok, Facebook, and X (formerly Twitter). According to Asad Baig, co-founder at MMfD, Scrapathon is a precursor to MMfD’s fact-checking tool, which is expected to be rolled out to at least nine mainstream newsrooms across the country by the end of January 2024.
The next sessions will be held in Islamabad.
