Information Ministry’s fake news buster Twitter account gets fabricated in a day

The Ministry of Information and Broadcast launched yesterday, a Twitter account FakeNewsBusterMoIB to curb the spread of misinformation and fake news through social media.

Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf (PTI) announced that the new account has been created on the orders of Information Minister Fawad Chaudhry to combat the propagation of false news by giving an official and timely response.

However, in less than 24 hours, the FakeNewsBusterMoIB Twitter account has been fabricated by another fake account. The imposter Twitter account has an identical display photo, title, and bio as the authentic account.

The FakeNewsBusterMoIB has tweeted to warn about the fake account and distinguish the real Twitter handle.

The tweet reads that the official account can be verified through the website of the Ministry of Information and Broadcast. The Ministry has also reported the fabrication attempt to the National Response Center for Cyber Crime (NR3C) of Federal Investigation Agency so appropriate investigation and legal action can be carried out. At the time of this news coverage, the imposter account has either been removed or renamed.

With the popularity of social media as a means of sharing news, the spread of misinformation and fake propaganda has become an everyday occurrence. While the fabrication attempt is an irony of its own, the efforts of the government to fight fake news should be recognized. At the end of the day, the responsibility lies with all of us to help curb the spread of fake news.