Big Leaf Foundation has created a short film about the dangers of fake news stories, which have been particularly prevalent during the coronavirus pandemic. Young people are at increased risk of being deliberately targeted by malicious disinformation. This film aims to help everyone identify - and avoid spreading - fake news.
Fake news, malicious disinformation and wildly inaccurate rumours have surged during the pandemic, with regular reports of vulnerable or minority groups being deliberately targeted by scammers, criminal gangs and extremist organisations, aiming to capitalise on lockdown anxiety and escalate fear, confusion and social division.
Misleading health advice, ill-informed conspiracy theories and manipulative politicising of COVID guidelines put everyone at risk. And at a time when social distancing has pushed people back into their rooms with the internet for company, we have been increasingly concerned about the impact of it all on the young people we support.
Advice is out there, but as is so often the case, the sources of information usually require excellent comprehension of English, or rely on subtitles in one or two languages only, which not only excludes those from different linguistic backgrounds, but assumes a level of native language literacy that is not always present.
Working with writer, campaigner and migration expert, Ahmad al-Rashid, Tribal Worldwide London creative director Richard Cable, BBC journalist, reporter and film-maker Rachel Wright, producer Paris Palmer and Big Leaf Volunteer Dr Toby Athersuch, we have created a short film in 10 languages, representative of our displaced young people.
These films underline the growing prevalence of fake news and disinformation in the COVID climate, look at the steps that can be taken to help spot it, and underline the importance of not sharing stories if you can’t be sure they are true.
They have been recorded separately in Arabic, Kurmanji, Sorani, Farsi, Hausa, Amharic, Tigrinya, Albanian and Vietnamese thanks to the generosity of BBC World Service journalists and members of our own displaced community.
You can watch the films below, or directly on our YouTube channel. The films are free to watch and for everyone to share.
Watch the films
Scam text messages
It's not just fake news that has increased during the pandemic, the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) says: cyber criminals are preying on fears of the coronavirus and sending ‘phishing’ text messages that try to trick users into clicking on a bad link and sharing personal or financial information. Messages are short and simple and often claim to be from a known entity.
We've created simple translations of an NCSC leaflet highlighting some of the top SMS scams with some tips on how to verify if a message is real.