(Note that Healthguard, a subset of this for just health information, is available for free.) This is listed as "Free with in-app purchases", but it's really a mandatory subscription. Downloading and installing it does nothing except put a "?" shield icon in your browser telling you to sign up (with payment). There's a preview period, but only after you pay.
I learned about this app from an article on the Democratic National Committee website about combating disinformation. I don’t normally pay for apps but I checked this out because the DNC recommended it. Otherwise I’d probably never have considered it because I don’t really look at much disinformation online because almost all of my information sources are quite reputable and reliable. But when NewsGuard presents you with its assessment of a news site you get as many examples as needed to solidly validate the evaluation of various journalistic practices, information about ownership, investors, management structure, the history of the site, whatever is relevant to how the quantitative ratings were arrived at. Every piece of information is backed up with a link to its source
The app does a great job of detailing each news site, states current examples of stories from the site and if they are accurate or not with linked sources to back it all up. Those complaining that this is an anti conservative app are just mad that the places they get their news are filled with false or altered stories and stay away from the truth. The app is great at debunking sites on both the left and the right, it’s just a fact that the sites to right are more often spreading false information. The app is fair, transparent and factual and they back it all up with sources and repeated requests to sites for clarification on their stories.
I an an unapologetic liberal. I am also a news junky who hates media for putting profits above honesty. This behavior causes me to be skeptical of ALL for-profit news sources. I spend countless hours researching news that is questionable. I AM YOUR DREAM CUSTOMER. I would gladly pay you to provide reliable evaluations of content. BUT, I DELETED YOUR APP AFTER DOWNLOADING IT BECAUSE YOU WON’t ALLOW ME TO ASSESS YOUR SERVICE WITHOUT SEEING WHAT I’M BUYING) I don’t commit my time or money blindly. (your signup procedure takes my time, more so if I have to cancel in 2 weeks) It’s a shame that an honest company trying to stay in business while providing a valuable service may fail because of a bad business model. Trust your customers (I have never seen evaluations so bifurcated, only 1s and 5s) your market is already cynical don’t give us a silly reason to avoid you
Misleading (which is really ironic when you think about it)
This is a pay app but they don’t say that up front. You can sign up for an account and when you get to the give us your credit card information, there’s an option that says “Continue signing up for a 2-week free trial subscription,” but you’re required to give your credit card information. Huh?? If you don’t want to, there’s a “Maybe Later” link that should be labeled (if they’re being truthful), “click here to leave this page but you won’t be able to use the app until you give us your credit card information even though we have a 2-week “free” trial.”
NewsGuard helps me decide if I want to trust a news website. If you hover over the NewsGuard icon , you can quickly see why the site is trustworthy (or not). If you want more information, you can click through to a longer-write up that includes details like who owns and operates the website. It's also really helpful for my kids' homework assignments!
This tool is very consistent across all of its ratings and uses multiple verification points across all channels throughout its entire platform. Has so far checked out for me in most aspects. When it is hard to go back to browsing without something you now have, that’s how you especially no it’s useful.
It is impossible for me to log in to NewsGuard and verify news sites, even though I signed up for an account and started a subscription. Whenever I enter my credentials, it keeps demanding that I subscribe to use the app, even though I ALREADY have a subscription. When I try to renew my purchase, it glitches. If I have to pay a subscription, I should be paying for something that works. At least Media Bias Fact Check is available free of charge.
I’m a freelance journalist and run every source I use through Newsguard. I’m a moderate and have no stake in which sources get higher or lower ratings. This one is by far the most fair and accurate. If you read the news, use this please!
I don't think the people that get news from free and unreliable online sources would be willing to seek out this app and pay $3/month. The money would be better spent towards a subscription to a reliable news source like NYT, WSJ, Apple News , etc.
I agree with many others. I think this is a valuable service, but that’s all because I can’t review the work that has been done without registering. And the maybe later button is actually “If you don’t want to pay, bye bye” You need to make it easier for potential customers to be able to judge whether you do what you say you do. It sounds good to me but I guess I’ll never know.
If you’re not scrutinizing your news sources then you’re just letting any crazy person with an idea infiltrate your life. Best thing possible during a time of misinformation.
This is a blatant leftist created app that flags factual and proven true news as misleading or false. It also shows proven fake news to be true and trustworthy. If you look at the group of people that run this laughable cringeworthy project, you’ll understand why they do this. Orwell really was ahead of his time. They should just call themselves the Ministry of Truth while they’re at it.
Another fake news fail disguising itself as “non bias fact checkers” in order to silence opposing views of the people funding them. Also deceptive, as they lure you in only to find out the app is paid. Is your dark money censorship checks not enough that you also have to charge people for this misinformation labeled as fact checking?
I would rather have seen it cost $2.99 to install rather than free then stop you cold and demand a subscription to even open it. Developers could THEN tell you they’d refund you if you cancel. Just saying it’s too bad seniors who need it the most probably aren’t in the position to pay for it.
I wanted to give this a fair chance. But it just gets silly as all roads take you to an extremely establishmentarian view that all “good,” cultured people with the latest and most-updated correct opinions share. This is the work of a totalitarian mind who fears opinions that differ or challenge her own.
If you are just looking for an echo chamber and can't handle any opposing points of view, then this app is definitely for you. If you like to hear more than one side of a story, then stay far away from newsguard. As the app name suggests, they will guard you from actual news
Run by lefty looneys….. color coded cause the dumb can’t read !!!! Run by woke people from a university ! Vet your fact checkers properly because if you research this one just like Politifact …… you’ll find a history of being wrong and the facts are mostly opinions !!!! And opinions are not facts !!
There’s a very good reason why Prager University is suing this organization. The New York Times, the Los Angeles Times, CNN, all get top ratings. While decent news organizations although right leaning get much lower ratings. It’s obviously Clickbait for the left leaning don’t take the bait do your own research
An app that rates the legitimacy of news sources, but openly admits that news sources can pay for rating boosts? Strike one. An app that refuses to acknowledge fake news put out by its top paying sources, but assigns poor ratings on new sources for reporting things that later turned out to be indisputably true? Strike two. Giving a news source a poor rating claiming they used untrustworthy sources for they data, but the source they used was newsgusrd certified? Strike three. You played yourself. Good job.
What makes this app great is using a proxy filter to label certain sites or "domain's". I personaly consider this a great example using proxys for good intentions and flip's the script..
This app is not to be trusted; the information they provided have some programed codes that don’t give accurate information be aware that whoever is behind this app is not square with the fact they provide.
But before they tell you that you need a subscription, they ask you to sign up by giving your email. For a service that purports to grade sources based on their integrity, this is NOT transparent and a huge fail. I rate you: DISHONEST.
Extremely biased. They use their criteria to ream all right leaning news outlets. I suppose they don’t even read the lefty outlets because you’ll find some of the least journalistic, most dishonest sites - ranked with a perfect score.
Extremely Biased. They should be ashamed of what they are doing to PragerU (a non-profit that is not even a news website nor does it claim to be) for a very small amount of its content that doesn’t match the liberal consensus. Pathetic.
You are biased bullies. Keep your ridiculous ratings to yourself. I can think for myself and don’t need your partisan agenda censoring free speech. You’re what is wrong with America right now.
The subscription requirement should be clearly stated in the app description but it is not. The Mac plugin doesn’t appear to require a subscription so I assumed the iOS version was similar.
Disgustingly and blatantly liberal. Masquerading as an arbiter of accuracy in reporting, this group / app is a sham promoting every single liberal “news” organization while denigrating and assigning failing scores to all Conservative leaning news outlets. Y’all are pathetic.
This app is exactly the opposite of what it professes. I could write a long review detailing its lies and inversions of truth, but I submit to thee one litmus test that should say it all: it rates CNN as one of the most reliable news sources. That is all.
This app is a good start. A few minor complaints — the theme should follow system-wide dark/light mode options and it would be great if the search would show the rating in-line (such as cnn.com...87.5/100 in the search results) but, overall, very good and useful.
If they can’t follow basic instructions on how to implement Apple or Facebook oauth, something a 13 year old could do, why should I trust them to rate news...
This so called “FACT CHECKER” organization has now become (really was since its inception)a ALT-LEFT-Democratic propaganda machine. Don’t expect anything but opposite of the truth.
I love that Newsguard "shows its work" by telling us the criteria used and why the reviewer(s) rated each source as it did. Now if you can just keep it up to date with policy and leadership changes it will be perfect! ps please review Morningstar.com. Then you'll be perfect.
Decide to try free trial. Doesn’t work. It said there were no results for every sight I put in. I put in NBCNEWS.com and it said “no results”. This app is not worth it. It doesn’t work
Well almost fooled me! I wouldn’t pay a penny for this ridiculous app. News guard, who is guarding you? Apparently no one. After purchasing this app and using it for a bit, I noticed that they not only lean left, they are in bed with the left!! I watch both CNN and FOX news, as I agree that fox is wrong here and there, CNN has been not only wrong many times, but has suppressed important news purposely and keeps doing so to protect its elite backers. I give news guard a score of 20/100 shame on you!! Your a wolf in sheep’s clothing.
Well I downloaded the app from the Apple store. Immediately the search box filled with a slow typing name of a news search. Could not dislodge or over type this. Realized it was a demo and pulled screen to left for more demo. One more left for last demo. Click “done” at bottom and you finally get a login. No “register” link. Anywhere. Try login to see if you get a relevant link. Nope. Check little menu upper right. Nope. They say on landing, “Type code if you have access institution”. Brilliant. :( Developers have wasted your 49.5 megabytes since the app is locked to individual users with no institutional affiliation.
NewsGuard's reliability ratings for news and information sources help users make decisions about which news sources to trust—and avoid misinformation and disinformation. Our ratings, scores, and Nutrition Labels for websites are displayed next to links on search engines and social media platforms and cover all the news websites accounting for 95% of online engagement. Ratings are conducted by a team of experienced journalists using nine basic, apolitical journalistic criteria. Each site receives a trust score of 0-100, an overall rating level ranging from “High Credibility” to “Proceed with Caution,” and a thorough Nutrition Label report detailing the site’s ownership and financing, content, credibility practices, transparency practices, and history. NewsGuard is for personal use only. Any commercial, research, or other non-personal use of NewsGuard is strictly prohibited by our Terms of Service: https://www.newsguardtech.com/terms-of-service/
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