Annie Lab is a fact-checking initiative at the Journalism and Media Studies Centre at the University of Hong Kong (HKU Journalism) in collaboration with ANNIE (Asian Network of News & Information Educators), a not-for-profit educational organization registered in Hong Kong (a company limited by guarantee: CR number 2890935). The University of Hong Kong is a publicly funded tertiary institution. The registration certificates of ANNIE are attached.

Information about our legal status and other eligibility can be found on this page:

https://annielab.org/about/  

The Annie Lab is registered as a not-for-profit educational organization in Hong Kong (a company limited by guarantee: CR number 2890935). The status is body cooperate and expiration date is 7-11-2023. 

1. We established Annie Lab in October 2019 in order to investigate false claims, misleading factoids, exaggerations, propaganda, hoaxes, rumors, questionable content, and other types of misinformation and disinformation that are being masqueraded and distributed as news. We tried to create an environment that simulates a daily working newsroom. It is a hybrid of professional news organization and student training program based on the pedagogical models developed by ANNIE and supervised by faculty members of HKU Journalism.

2. We have two full-time supervising editors, one managing editor (starting in January 2023), and the editor-in-chief, all of whom are former journalists working at HKU Journalism as faculty members. About a dozen student reporters work in the newsroom every week in rotating shifts.

3. We have been regularly publishing fact-checking articles, about three stories per week for the last six months, on our main website (http://annielab.org) and social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Since Annie Lab is tied to credit-bearing journalism courses, we also train our student reporters in classrooms. We also offer internship opportunities for entry-level journalists. Through HKU Journalism and ANNIE, our lab members are also engaging in public seminars, media literacy campaigns, research projects, and other related activities in the field of misinformation and fact-checking.

4. Our goal in 2023 is to expand the newsroom and build more capacity to produce fact-checking videos and other audio-visually-oriented content besides text and memes. We are also launching a six-month-long investigation into the ecosystem of climate misinformation in China between Jan and June. 

The Annie Lab was started in October 2019 and order to investigate false claims, misleading factoids, exaggerations, propaganda, hoaxes, rumors, questionable content, and other types of misinformation and disinformation that are being masqueraded and distributed as news. 

The Annie Lab has two full-time supervising editors who are former journalists working at Hong Kong University faculty members. The other around a dozen journalism students reporters work in the newsroom every week. 

The Annie Lab plan to produce fact-checking videos and other audio-visual-oriented and plan to launch a six-month-long investigation into the ecosystem of climate misinformation in China in 2023.

We published 69 fact-checking stories in the last 23 weeks -- on average, three stories per week.

The Annie Lab produced average 6 to 7 fact-check stories in a month, it mean more than 1 story a week. The applicant country doesn't have 5 verified signatories. 

All of our past stories since 2019 are available on our website: https://annielab.org/archive/

The fact-check contents of the Annie Lab were related with politics, education, public health, conflict, protest, natural disaster, and international politics. It has an impact on the welfare or well-being of individuals, the general public or society. 

Annie Lab’s operation is tied to credit-bearing journalism courses at the University of Hong Kong, a publicly funded tertiary institution. All expenses are part of the university budget, and the lab has no separate accounting.

In the previous financial year, we received HK$700,000 (about US$90,000) from Google News Initiative to sustain and expand the Annie Lab operation at the university.  This grant was routed from ANNIE, a registered company limited by guarantee with a not-for-profit structure in Hong Kong, to the university/Annie Lab in November 2022.

Annie Lab was also awarded the Check Global Independent Media Response Fund by Meedan in December. The grant of US$9,000 will be transferred in early 2023.

We have no relationship with any governmental or political organization.

Annie Lab's fact-checking stories were not seen political bias to government, political parties, and politician. 

Annie Lab did not receive any fund from local or foreign government and political parties or organizations. 

We have no funding from local or foreign state or political sources.

Annie Lab did not receive any fund from local or foreign state or political sources. 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria.

We do not take any political position or advocate for any course of action. Every fact check by our reporters is subject to editorial scrutiny by the faculty members at the Journalism & Media Studies Centre. In the context of 2022, misinformation related to Ukraine and COVID-19 dominated our monitoring (both topics have been largely politicized in Hong Kong and China). We have checked claims from diverse political spectrums with the same rigor and frequency. To demonstrate our standards and fact-checking process, we chose the following ten politically charged stories related to China and Hong Kong as examples:

1. Misleading: Video shows 2020 US Navy expedition, not Pelosi being escorted to Taiwan: https://annielab.org/2022/08/18/misleading-video-shows-2020-u-s-navy-expedition-not-pelosi-being-escorted-to-taiwan/

2. Misleading: WHO asked Ukraine to destroy pathogens in public health labs, not bioweapons (Claims were made by Chinese officials): https://annielab.org/2022/03/21/misleading-who-asked-ukraine-to-destroy-pathogens-in-public-health-laboratories-not-bioweapons/ 

3. Investigation: Misleading claims about masks and vaccines in Hong Kong’s 5th wave https://annielab.org/2022/05/25/investigation-misleading-claims-about-masks-and-vaccines-in-hong-kongs-5th-wave/

4. Misleading: Media’s Guangzhou protest coverage includes old video from 2017 https://annielab.org/2022/11/16/misleading-medias-guangzhou-protest-coverage-includes-old-video-from-2017/

5. False: Images of ‘smiling’ newscasters announcing Shinzo Abe’s death are doctored https://annielab.org/2022/07/15/false-images-of-smiling-newscasters-announcing-shinzo-abes-death-are-doctored/

6. False: Photo shows two US aircraft carriers; neither is China’s Fujian warship https://annielab.org/2022/10/25/false-photo-shows-two-us-aircraft-carriers-neither-is-chinas-fujian/

7. Misleading: People handcuffed outside hospital are suspected illegal immigrants https://annielab.org/2022/02/18/misleading-people-handcuffed-outside-hospital-are-suspected-illegal-immigrants/

8. Misleading: Protest in Chongqing happened last year over parking fees, not last month over social restrictions https://annielab.org/2022/10/19/misleading-protest-in-chongqing-happened-last-year-over-parking-fees-not-last-month-over-social-restrictions/

9. Misleading: ATMs in Shanghai were never suspended over fears of virus-carrying banknotes https://annielab.org/2022/06/30/misleading-atms-in-shanghai-were-never-suspended-over-fears-of-virus-carrying-banknotes/

10. Misleading: Video shows a rescue robot in Japan, not Communist Party’s ‘corpse picker’ https://annielab.org/2022/07/14/misleading-video-shows-a-rescue-robot-in-japan-not-communist-partys-corpse-picker/

Annie Lab produced the fact-checking stories which are well verified the sources, research the fact, video, picture and contact to relevant persons or expert sources. The Annie Lab choose different misleading and false claim like tension of Taiwan, Covid-19 pandemic, Ukraine-Russia war and using high standard of evidence and judgement regardless of who made these claims. 

We state on the page that Annie Lab does not take any political position or advocate for any course of action.

https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/

Following are our methods and criteria:

- To judge whether something is true or false, we gather first-hand information and supporting evidence as much as possible.

- All evidence collected in the verification process will be included in the story with links, embeds, screen captures, or other appropriate forms.

- Our story must be presented so that the audience can replicate our process before reaching a conclusion.

- We select potentially problematic claims by evaluating their probable harm (if not true). It is the first criterion when deciding what to fact-check.

- The significance of misinformation is also assessed by its audience reach (the number of shares, comments, likes, views, etc.) in our process.

- Unless we are absolutely certain about the conclusion, we will not publish any story. 

 Annie Lab announced their standards on the website as https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/, they stated as their principle as "does not take any political position or advocate for any course of action" on it. 

These labels and standards reflex and clearly state how Annie Lab choose the claims to check. 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria.

Annie Lab has complied with the criteria 2.3 of the guideline according to reviewed the fact checks of previous year. The applicant disclose the relevant interests of the sources it quotes where the reader might reasonably conclude those interests could influence the accuracy of the evidence provided if the fact checks are needed or relevant to this criteria. 

Annie Lab publicized their policy on the website as " Our Label and Standards", and mentioned "do not take any political position or advocate for any one course of action" under the label and standards.

https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/

Annie Lab announced their policy on non-partisanship for their staff on site. On the Annie Lab website " https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/". It published their guideline which can be assessed by audience that their fact check contents are in-line with the guideline and non-partisanship. 

Annie Lab used several sources in a fact-check story "Misleading: People handcuffed outside hospital are suspected illegal immigrants". Firstly the two claims of misleading on illegal immigrants handcuffed outside of hospital. Annie Lab verified the pictures with 4 different news sources and 2 other government public information sources. Annie Lab provide relevant source of links 

https://annielab.org/2022/02/18/misleading-people-handcuffed-outside-hospital-are-suspected-illegal-immigrants/

A randomised sample https://annielab.org/2022/10/19/misleading-protest-in-chongqing-happened-last-year-over-parking-fees-not-last-month-over-social-restrictions/ about a protest in Chongqing over parking fees,  Annie Lab tried to find the original video footage which was used in the claim, Annie Lab found the 3 news coverage sources of original video footage and happening. Annie Lab also verified the geolocation of video footage with Baidu maps, and another verification is the cases in public record of complaint of government office of Chongqing about the protest. Annie Lab verified the claims sources video with 3 original news reports and 1 geolocation evidence and 1 public information record, and it show using primary sources for the fact-check. 

The applicant complies with the criteria,  

https://annielab.org/2023/04/24/misleading-video-of-prominent-factories-closure-in-china-includes-plants-that-are-still-in-business/

In this fact check, Annie Lab checked all the key elements of the claim video about prominent factory closures in China. Annie Lab checked the first video of the claim about BYD Auto factory closure with the company website, the company recruitment website, and the Shenzhen Commercial News website as well. For the second video clip of the claim, Annie Lab checked three different articles that mentioned the LG Innotek factory closure, another industry information hub, a Baidu map, and the LG original source video as well. Annie Lab checked the third part of the fact check with government websites, a business news report, and social media Weibo user contents.

Therefore, the applicant is compliant with the criteria.

https://annielab.org/2023/03/24/analysis-an-array-of-misinformation-about-earthquakes-in-turkey/

In this claim, the applicant checked all elements of the claim and found more than one source of evidence: the location of the bridge, which is 1000 kilometers away from the earthquake epicenter, and the construction companies that were involved in the bridge. Then the applicant saves one source, which is the only source relevant to the topic.

https://annielab.org/2023/07/07/no-evidence-for-bomb-attack-or-20-dead-americans-in-a-kyiv-hotel/

The above link of the claim, the applicant checked all elements of the claim and found more than one source of evidence: the Kyiv Raddisson Blu hotel staff, the official telegram channel of Kyiv city military administration release , news coverage about US citizen casualty, and other photo location checks. The applicant save one source which is the only source relevant to the topic. 

Annie Lab has identified the relevant interests of the sources in its fact-check, an example fact-check https://annielab.org/2021/11/08/misleading-video-discussing-chinese-communist-vaccine-plan-was-not-leaked-from-china/ , a misleading online live TV news which is about China’s plot to weaken US troops with vaccines’ is not organized by the Communist Party but by US website. Annie Lab identified some sources could have interests as 

"The COVID-19 pandemic has become a diplomatic flashpoint between China and the United States as of late.

Washington has continued to float the possibility that the virus originated in a Chinese lab, despite the lack of conclusive evidence.

Beijing, in turn, is reportedly pushing their own theory that the virus was brought over by the U.S. military.

Both sides have also been the target of vaccine misinformation campaigns." 

The reader might reasonably conclude those interests could influence the accuracy of evidence provided. 

As indicated in the above sections, we are an independent fact-checking newsroom hosted at the University of Hong Kong and supervised by the faculty members of its journalism program.

The partner organization ANNIE, an educational not-for-profit entity in Hong Kong, was established by one of the faculty members to develop teaching and learning materials for news literacy education. To be exact, ANNIE is a registered company limited by guarantee with a not-for-profit structure, and its annual report will be publicly available and searchable through the Hong Kong government’s Companies Registry — CR number 2890935. ANNIE provides consultancy services for a fee, but it is not related to the fact-checking operation at HKU.

Annie Lab has published their sources of funding in detailed under the about menu of its website https://annielab.org/about/.

In the about section, the Annie Lab announced their sources of funding of 2021 to 2023. 

Information is available at: https://annielab.org/about/

We state on the page: Annie Lab’s operation is tied to credit-bearing journalism courses at the University of Hong Kong, a publicly funded tertiary institution. ANNIE donates a certain amount of money annually to the Journalism and Media Studies Centre in order to support its journalism teaching activities.

ANNIE is a registered company limited by guarantee with a not-for-profit structure in Hong Kong. Its annual report (tax filing) will be publicly available and searchable through Hong Kong government’s Companies Registry — CR number 2890935.

HKU Journalism accepts direct donations from external funders, and Annie Lab received the following financial support specific to the newsroom operation.

In 2022: Google News Initiative: HK$700,000 (about US$90,000)

In 2023: Check Global Independent Media Response Fund by Meedan: US$9,000 (to be awarded in early 2023)

The ownership of Annie Lab is University of Hong Kong, a publicly funded tertiary institution and it clearly published it under the menu of "about"in its website. 

Information is available at: https://annielab.org/about/

Annie Lab offers a lab environment that simulates a working newsroom. It is a hybrid of professional news organization and student training program based on the pedagogical models developed by ANNIE and supervised by faculty members of HKU Journalism, all of whom are former journalists who have worked in various Asian countries.

Every fact check by students goes through editorial scrutiny by the faculty members at the Journalism & Media Studies Centre. Currently, we have four editors (faculty members) involved in Annie Lab's "teaching newsroom" every day.

Annie Lab shared their organization structure as key personals of fact-check team as the link of https://annielab.org/about/. 

On that section it published 1 editor-in-chief, 2 supervising editors, 1 managing editor and students from journalism faculty as contributors. 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria.

Information is available at: https://annielab.org/about/ 

- Cherry Lai / Supervising Editor

Cherry is a teaching assistant at HKU Journalism and works as one of the two supervising editors. She joined the university in June 2020. Before beginning a career in teaching fact-checking, Cherry was a senior radio reporter at Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK), covering healthcare policies and medical news. Cherry started her journalism career as a newspaper reporter at Mingpao.

- Purple Romero / Supervising Editor

Purple is a teaching assistant at HKU Journalism and also a supervising editor. As an experienced multimedia journalist, she has produced reports on the environment, gender issues, labor migration and foreign relations for such news organizations as Rappler, Channel News Asia, South China Morning Post and VICE. Before joining Annie Lab, Purple also worked as a member of the fact-checking team at AFP Philippines.

- Mimi Lau / Managing Editor (starting January 2023)

Mimi is an assistant lecturer at HKU Journalism and the managing editor of the Annie Lab. Prior to joining the faculty, Mimi was the China Correspondent for the South China Morning Post, covering politics and policies with a focus on human rights, religion, and ethnic affairs. Mimi received numerous awards in her 17-year career covering China and Hong Kong. She was also the host of SCMP’s Inside China podcast.

- Masato Kajimoto / Editor-in-chief

Masato is an associate professor of practice at HKU Journalism and also the founder of ANNIE. He specializes in misinformation ecosystem research, news literacy education, fact-checking practice, and press freedom studies, with a strong regional focus on countries in the Asia-Pacific. Before joining HKU, Masato worked as a reporter for CNN International.

- Student reporters

All stories featured on our website are written by HKU students who work in shifts Monday through Friday under the editorial guidance of the faculty members. About a dozen students are involved in fact-checking every week. Each of our stories carries a byline that shows reporters’ names. For a sensitive story, however, we use the “Annie Lab Team” byline for security concerns."

Annie Lab publicized the professional biographies of the key personals of its fact-check newsroom in https://annielab.org/about/ and organization structure also published in above page of its websites. 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria.

Information is available at: https://annielab.org/contact-us/

Annie Lab shared the contact information to the newsroom in their website https://annielab.org/contact-us/ and also announced hotline for claims to be investigate and complaint as well. It provide not only email but also social media contact to Annie Lab. 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria. 

https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/

Annie Lab publish its guideline in 3 points, verification methods and criteria in 6 points and naming and contacting the source(s) of misinformation in 4 points under the title of "Our Labels and Standards". 

Therefore Annie Lab complied with the criteria.

Annie Lab explained the reason of chose its in the fact-check story, Annie Lab stressed that how much it reached and  https://annielab.org/2021/08/05/investigation-a-group-of-doctors-spreading-misleading-claims-about-covid-19-vaccines/ as important for public on understanding the Covid-19 vaccines. 

Annie Lab chose the relevant evidence that appear to support and the evidence that appear undermine it. 

In this fact-check story https://annielab.org/2022/03/21/misleading-who-asked-ukraine-to-destroy-pathogens-in-public-health-laboratories-not-bioweapons/, it used evidence "the professor of Uppsala university, Sweden" it support the claim  and also other evidence http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/northamerica/20220308/cf0d75294eb649f098f33dcde4a01495/c.html which appear to undermine the claim as well. 

In the fact-check story "Experts say vaccines do not fuel COVID-19 variants or make humans more prone to infections",  Annie Lab used high standards applied to equivalent claims regardless of who made the claim. The claim was made by a Wall Street Journal columnist who is also an editorial board member of the journal. Annie Lab analyzes how the columnist referred to some clinical studies out of context.  Therefore, Annie Lab is compliant with the criteria.

https://annielab.org/2023/02/02/analysis-experts-say-vaccines-do-not-fuel-covid-19-variants-or-make-human-more-prone-to-infections/

According to the randomised sample of the applicant's fact checks, the applicant has tried to contact the original uploader and other possible sources to get supporting documents. In the claim of Misleading: Woman posing with indigenous men is not ex-head of Shandong University the applicant tried to contact the travel blogger through her social media account several times but the travel blogger did not respond to the applicant.

In another ramdomised sample Misleading: This Beijing air pollution image is old and digitally manipulated the applicant tried to contact the Chinese image bank Quanjing.com to verify the original photograph but the website did not respond to the applicant. The applicant have try to contact possible contact as much as they can to get supported documents. Therefore the applicant meet the criteria 5.5

Besides the contact page (https://annielab.org/contact-us/), we communicate with our users on social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

However, the reality is that many requests come from working professional journalists in Hong Kong, and they would often message editors directly and personally.

Our editorial team also gets feedback and responses from the audience through Twitter, often directly to the personal accounts of the editors and reporters, too.

The applicant set up "Hotline" menu in their website to fill the form the link of claim which the user want to fact check. The applicant also mentioned the other contact detailed of Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and email as well. The applicant did not explain about what will be fact-checked and what isn't fact-checkable.  

The following disclaimer is permanently shown on our website beside every story.

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Disclaimer: Although faculty members at the Journalism & Media Studies Centre at the University of Hong Kong have done everything possible to verify the accuracy of the story, we cannot guarantee there are no mistakes. If you notice an error or have any questions, please email us (contact@annieasia.org)

聲明：香港大學新聞及傳媒研究中心教職員已核查及編輯本文，盡可能確保其準確性。然而我們無法保證文章內容完全準確無誤。如發現錯誤或對文章內容有任何疑問，請通過電子郵件與我們聯繫。

声明：香港大学新闻及传媒研究中心教职员对本文进行核查和编辑，尽可能确保其准确性。然而我们并不能保证文章内容完全准确无误。如发现错误或对文章内容有任何疑问，请通过电子邮件与我们联系。

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Our correction policy is stated as follows at https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/

"When mistakes are made, we will correct the information in the original story with a clear indication of what has been changed. We will subsequently correct our relevant social media posts as well." 

Annie Lab published its disclaimer on right column of fact-check story page, and also correction policy on https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/. 

Therefore Annie Lab meet this criteria. 

Our correction policy is stated as follows at https://annielab.org/our-labels-standards/

"When mistakes are made, we will correct the information in the original story with a clear indication of what has been changed. We will subsequently correct our relevant social media posts as well." 

Annie Lab stated their correction policy at "Our Label and Standards" that when mistake are made, Annie Lab will correct the information in the original story with a clear indication of what has been changed, and subsequently correct their relevant social media posts as well". It is enough statement. 

Therefore Annie Lab meet this criteria. 

We have published only one story that required immediate correction in 2022. 

False: Japan’s Abe did not oversee vaccine rollout or distribute ivermectin https://annielab.org/2022/07/18/false-japans-abe-did-not-oversee-vaccine-rollout-or-distribute-ivermectin/

[Correction] The previous version indicated that there was only one article on the WEF website discussing vaccine distribution before Abe resigned, but Annie Lab found many more related articles afterward. The relevant sentence has been updated.

The applicant did the correction in a fact-check story of "False: Japan's Abe did not oversee vaccine rollout or distribute ivermectin". The correction was published at the bottom of the fact-check story and clearly explained that which part of the story was corrected and how the applicant corrected. The applicant did not mentioned about correction request from readers. 

Therefore the applicant meet the criteria. 

https://annielab.org/contact-us/

On this page, we wrote:

If you have a complaint related to the content of the website, you can also use the above form or other methods to contact us.

Annie Lab is a verified signatory of the Code of Principles by the International Fact-checking Network.

IFCN has a complaints policy about possible violations of the Code.

If you would like to report Annie Lab to IFCN, you can do so on the IFCN website at the following address:

https://ifcncodeofprinciples.poynter.org/complaints-policy

The applicant post the announcement of complaint related to the content of the website, and also referred about IFCN complaints policy and provide the link of IFCN website address. 

The applicant meets the criteria. 

We are an independent fact-checking unit and not a part of a media company. 

Annie Lab is not a unit of a media company, therefore it may not need to provide the link of parent media company for honest and open corrections policy and provide evidence that it adheres to this.