• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, June 25, 2019

With manipulated videos looming as the next big disinformation disruptor, The Washington Post is expanding its role in "accountability journalism," launching a new platform for fact-checking manipulated video content.

"The Fact Checker's Guide to Manipulated Video" launches today with tools for and identifying and labeling various forms of online video manipulation, including:

* Misrepresentation -- Presenting unaltered video in an inaccurate  manner that misrepresents the footage and misleads the viewer.

* Isolation -- Sharing a brief clip from a longer video in a way that creates a false narrative that does not reflect the event as it occurred.

* Omission -- Editing out large portions from a video and presenting it as a complete narrative, despite missing key elements, is a technique used to skew reality.

* Splicing -- Editing together disparate videos fundamentally alters the story that is being told.

* Doctoring -- Altering the frames of a video — cropping, changing speed, using Photoshop, dubbing audio, or adding or deleting visual information — in a way that deceives the viewer.

* Fabrication -- Using Artificial Intelligence to create high-quality fake images simulates audio and convincingly swaps out background images. Deepfakes and other synthetic media fall into this category.

“The Internet is increasingly populated with false and misleading videos that are spread by politicians, advocacy groups and others and viewed by millions,”  Glenn Kessler, editor and chief writer of "The Fact Checker" said in a post announcing the new platform.

“Building on the context and analysis we provide in our written and video fact checks, we want this system of labeling videos to become the standard for journalists to help people be more informed as they navigate the information landscape.”

The guide is accessible via an interactive page featuring an updated catalog of video examples and graphic explainers of why the video falls into a specific category.

It also fields for users to submit examples of manipulated videos they've come across that the paper's fact-checking staff presumably will review and debunk.