April 14, 2025 Supporters of Malta’s Labour Party are sharing photorealistic AI-generated images in partisan Facebook groups that attempt to portray opposition leader Bernard Grech at a civil society protest in the capital city of Valletta. A protest was held by a number of local NGOs on 2nd April 2025 outside the parliament building in […]
March 10, 2025 AI-generated videos are filling social media feeds, and they are looking increasingly real, even if logic suggests otherwise. Take this video, for example, which is currently doing the rounds on Instagram. It appears to show a team of fishermen out at sea hauling a mammoth oyster onto their boat. They proceed to
Fact-check Malta: Fishing for attention – AI-generated videos making waves Read More »
March 10, 2025 The role of the court expert has come under recent scrutiny, following British forensic accountant Jeremy Harbinson’s refusal to travel to Malta to testify in a prominent criminal case. Harbinson is one of the authors of a 1,200 page report into the privatisation of Karin Grech, St Luke’s and Gozo general hospitals
Fact-check Malta: Can a court expert refuse to testify? Read More »
March 6, 2025 Valentine’s Day is usually a celebration of love. But this year, the White House put a dark spin on the popular ‘roses are red, violets are blue’ refrain to promote deportations, unwittingly duping several people into thinking its social media Valentine’s Day post was false. Around 14th February, social media users around
February 21, 2025 Earlier this year we highlighted a barrage of posts by fake pages and profiles targeting people interested in a popular artisan Christmas market in Malta. Scammers really never do take a holiday, and this particular tactic seems to be a growing trend. Another Facebook Event created by Malta Artisan Markets, this time
Fact-check Malta: Social media scammers strike again Read More »
February 4, 2025 The news of two fatal traffic accidents right at the beginning of the new year thrust long-standing concerns over road safety in Malta back into the spotlight. On Monday 6 January, 25-year-old Alejandro Brincat was killed after he lost control of his car in the town of Attard. On the same day, a
Fact-check Malta: Did a 2014 road safety strategy hit its targets? Read More »
January 3, 2025 Scams don’t take a holiday. In fact, it’s safe to expect more of them – on social media, SMS, phone calls or email – around festivities. We spotted one (or perhaps several) on Facebook just before Christmas. It wasn’t a post doing the rounds on a closed group. Instead, it was a
Fact-check Malta: Unwrapping disinformation – beware scams targeting events Read More »
December 13, 2024 Reports of HSBC’s looming departure from Malta in September sparked a torrent of speculation over what this meant for the bank’s clients, with some questioning what would happen to their savings and investments once the bank changed hands. The news was seemingly confirmed in recent weeks, with HSBC Malta telling its shareholders
Fact-check Malta: What happens when a bank changes hands? Read More »
November 20, 2024 A recently-resurfaced video clip shows a former Labour Party minister perpetuating misinformation about political murders in Malta. Joe Debono Grech, once a Labour minister in the 1980s and 1990s, was a guest on ‘Madwar Mejda’ (‘Around the Table’), a television programme on ONE, the station owned by Malta’s ruling Labour Party. During
Fact check Malta: Former politician peddles misinformation about political murders Read More »
November 13, 2024 A false story about a lost child, which was called out as a scam by an American TV station earlier this year, has made it to Malta. The post, which carries two identical photos of a young boy, claims the three-year-old was found in Malta and has been taken to a Police
Fact-check Malta: Scam Facebook post about lost three-year-old boy makes it to Malta Read More »
The Mediterranean Digital Media Observatory (MedDMO) is an alliance of fact-checkers, media literacy experts and scientists taking a coordinated approach to combating disinformation and misinformation.
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