Istinomer (https://www.istinomer.rs/) was established by the legally registered non-profit organization Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability - CRTA (https://crta.rs/). Istinomer is inscribed in the Media Register kept by the Serbian Business Register Agency [Registar javnih glasila], which is clearly stated in the "About" section on the Istinomer website:

https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

Besides on the Istinomer website, the registration document is also available on the link http://pretraga.apr.gov.rs/javnaglasila/PublicMediaBasicData.aspx?beid=3715&rnd=8FD269C0FB71CA88365D1D3A23DC6BE5DC2F516A.

This registry does not keep a record of the purpose of certain media, including Istinomer. However, Istinomer is officially and publicly defined as a fact-checking portal, dedicated to fact-checking and rating politicians' and public officials' claims, as well as debunking disinformation published on social media, which is Istinomer's core business. 

Istinomer is registered in the Serbian Business Registry, under the media section. Information about the registration is available to readers of their website within the "about" section. 

As the first fact-checking platform in the region of the Western Balkans, established in 2009 by its founding organization CRTA, Istinomer debunks disinformation and propaganda shared in digital space and public speech.

Istinomer was established to provide the audience with an effective fact-checking mechanism for assessing politicians’ and public officials’ accountability based on what they are saying and promising to their constituents and how they actually perform. Istinomer established a comprehensive, precise, and transparent methodology used to evaluate politicians’ and public officials’ claims in three categories: truthfulness, consistency, and fulfillment of promises. It uses uniform standards and methodology for each fact-check, relying on verifiable facts only to ensure the highest level of objectivity and fairness.

With the intensive spread of disinformation and conspiracy theories regarding the Covid-19 pandemic, the Istinomer team introduced fact-checking of disinformation shared on social media and debunked dozens of them, mostly health and science-related.

For the last 12 years since Istinomer was established, it has applied the highest professional standards and strict methodology in fact-checking to ensure impartiality and objectivity and preserve credibility. Besides fact-checking, Istinomer became recognized for its in-depth analyses of major developments and issues of public importance, as well as for video fact-checks, interviews, podcasts and innovative visual presentations of its findings in the online and digital sphere.

In addition to the ongoing publishing of the fact-checking and accountability journalism content at the Istinomer website, which reaches over 220.000 unique users monthly, Istinomer content was regularly promoted at Istinomer’s Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Instagram pages, which further increased the Istinomer outreach effect.

The Istinomer team includes editor-in-chief, seven journalists, a project coordinator and a media analyst and their biographies are published within the "Impressum" page on the Istinomer website (see the link https://www.istinomer.rs/redakcija/).

Besides reaching the broader public with its fact-checking content, in the following period the Istinomer team plans to invest additional efforts in fact-checking education of journalists who work in mainstream media with a goal to inspire them to establish fact-checking units within those media outlets, as the coronavirus pandemic followed by infodemic posed the need for even more fact-checkers who can provide trustworthy information on the ongoing pandemic and track widely shared false claims.

Istinomer was the first fact-checking platform set up exclusively for fact-checking purposes in the Western Balkans in 2009. Since then, Istinomer has been known for its professional standards and quality journalism. Their team consists of experienced editors and journalists.

Istinomer is making an effort to fact-check the claims that are referring to the facts in the public interest. Therefore, focus is on the public officials, since they have the opportunity to exercise power and to use public funds and should be accountable to the public. Besides public officials, the Istinomer team also rates different opposition politicians’ statements and collects their promises, particularly during the election campaign. Political affiliations of the people Istinomer evaluates play no role in its fact checks, but verifiable facts only. In the six months period from November 1, 2020, to April 1, 2021, Istinomer published 49 evaluations of politicians' and public officials’ claims (including the claims of the Crisis Team for Fighting the Coronavirus members). In the previous period, Istinomer has been focused on covering the health crisis caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, vaccine development, and government measures to prevent the spread of the virus. Istinomer was also reporting and fact-checking the statements on ecology, elections, economy including the average salary rates, rule of law, unemployment rate, and other key issues of public importance (more information available in attachment).

Fact-checks of the public officials’ and politicians’ claims in categories truthfulness, consistency, and fulfillment of promises are available on this link - https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/

With the intensive spread of disinformation and conspiracy theories regarding the Covid-19 pandemic, the Istinomer team introduced fact-checking of viral disinformation and debunked dozens of them, mostly health and science-related. During the previous six months, Istinomer published almost 60 fact-checks of false claims published in the media and on social networks.

All fact-checks of viral disinformation are available on this link - https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/

Since December 2020, Istinomer has regularly published fact-checks, covering various topics, approximately two or three times a week. 

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In the last three months, Istinomer has published numerous fact-checks covering relevant and timely topics such as health, fake news regarding Covid-19 and vaccines, but also topics related to daily politics.

Istinomer is an initiative of the nongovernmental organization Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability, CRTA, which can be seen in the registration document attached below. Since it was established, Istinomer received funds from projects CRTA and Istinomer were awarded by international donors and non-profit organizations interested in strengthening democracy and accountability in Serbia. CRTA and Istinomer never apply for funds from the state or local government budgets in order to preserve credibility and neutrality and ensure impartial reporting.

In the "About" section (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru), Istinomer published the list of donors for the last two years and the amount of money it was granted by each donor. The Istinomer work was supported through grants awarded in 2020 by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs within the Transition program (21,805 EUR), Internews within the Engaging Content Grant program (14,108 USD), and by the Open Society Foundation (1,267,248 RSD). As a partner of the Centre for Independent Living, Istinomer participated in the USAID-supported project “Do as you speak, together with people with disabilities” (5,000 USD). For the innovation in fact-checking, Istinomer was supported by the International Fact-checker Network and Facebook’s Journalism Project (49,971 USD).

Funds from all these projects were used for the operational costs of Istinomer, video production, organization of journalist trainings, conferences, panel discussions and other events.

All financial data, including auditors’ annual reports, are available on the CRTA website. The latest CRTA’s financial report is available on this link https://crta.rs/o-nama/#report. 

Istinomer has provided substantial information about its donors. Such information is available in the "about section" on their website, as well as on the website of their founding organization CRTA. Both Istinomer and CRTA deny ever applying for any of the state funds.

Readers can learn about the donors and amounts in the previous year on Istinomer's website, while audit reports (until 2019) are available on CRTA's website.

Information about Istinomer’s non-partisanship policy is available at this link - https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

Istinomer has strict rules on how to ensure objectivity regardless of their donors and their employees are prohibited from any political activism.

For the last 12 years since Istinomer was established, it applied the highest professional standards and strict methodology in fact-checking in order to ensure impartialness and objectivity and to preserve its credibility. Istinomer strives to rate as many different politicians and public officials and it evaluated almost 50 different claims in the previous six months. However, due to the fact that current president Aleksandar Vucic is the most powerful person in the country and that he delivers public speeches on a regular basis, presenting numerous facts that need to be examined for the sake of public interest, the Istinomer team more than others fact-checks his claims.

The Istinomer team of fact-checkers tends to use video materials to have original citations whenever possible in order to avoid misquoting and misinterpretation. When this is not possible, verbatim quotations published in different media outlets are being used. Journalists of Istinomer always contact people they rate in order to request further information about the given statement, whether it be comment or data. This way they also have the opportunity to react in case their statement was misquoted or taken out of context.

Journalists also contact responsible institutions in a search for data and use publicly available information and databases (both local and international), as well as FOI requests to obtain certain documents, contracts, etc.

Istinomer is open and honest about the sources in our articles - it names the source for every fact and every number.

The Istinomer team analyzes reports of domestic and international institutions and think thanks, search credible databases and consult experts in different fields, university professors, NGOs. No conclusion in the fact checks could be made based on unnamed sources, as Istinomer uses on-the-record sources and official documents.

Selection of the clams for the fact checks is made at the editorial meetings. The Istinomer team usually chooses recent claims, important statements where there is a strong public interest and never fact-checks claims only to prove someone was wrong. Istinomer examines something if journalists believe there is a demand for verified facts on a certain topic.

Istinomer also has internal procedures regarding the methodology that explain steps in the creation of Istinomer's fact checks. Istinomer journalists oblige the following internal procedures:

- to contact the actor for comment and/or data, to always refer to official information/research/statistical data (when possible),

- to contact the expert (individual or organization) for more information about the researched topic,

- to follow the copyright rules (especially for photos) etc.

Examples of evaluations of politicians’ and public officials’ claims published in the previous year:

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/nijedan-evropski-svetski-ni-susedni-drzavnik-nije-cestitao-vucicu-na-istorijskoj-pobedi/

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/emisije-iz-kostolca-nize-nego-dozvoljene-u-eu-i-na-nivou-koje-je-propisala-energetska-zajednica/

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/javna-nabavka-izrade-logoa-je-stopirana/

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/preminulo-je-13-14-lekara-ostali-nisu-imali-dodirne-tacke-sa-kovid-sistemom/

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/nema-preminulih-u-gerontoloskom-centru-u-sapcu/

Examples of the fact-checks of disinformation or misinformation published in media outlets and on social networks:

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/zvanicni-podaci-iz-izraela-nisu-pokazali-da-fajzer-vakcina-povecava-verovatnocu-umiranja-od-kovida-19/

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/sneg-koji-se-ne-topi-nije-nista-drugo-nego-sneg/

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/netacno-je-da-vakcinisani-protiv-kovida-19-ne-smeju-da-daju-krv/

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/putin-nije-odobrio-novi-zakon-koji-dozvoljava-zenama-da-ubiju-silovatelja-u-samoodbrani/

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/opsta-bolnica-u-cupriji-niti-operise-srce-niti-diskriminise-nevakcinisane-pacijenate/https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

It seems like Istinomer uses the same standards regardless of the topic and stakeholders. Due to the current political situation in the country, Serbia's ruling coalition and pro-government propaganda take a lot of space in the public sphere, thus it reflects on the topics they need to debunk too. 

https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

Istinomer's criteria and methodology are visible on their website and easily accessible to anyone visiting the page. 

Based on the fact-checks published in the course of the year, Istinomer doesn't show signs of support nor endorsement of political actors. The methodology used in the fact-checking process is precise and well explained in articles.

https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

According to Istinomer’s own Rules of Procedure which is published within the “About Istinomer” page, journalists and employees of the Istinomer may not be members and/or activists of political parties, nor hired by public opinion research agencies or other marketing agencies engaged in market research or public opinion polls.

Istinomer is a member of the Press Council, an independent, self-regulatory body that brings together publishers, owners of print and online media, news agencies and media professionals. As a member organization, Istinomer is obliged to respect and to actively promote the Serbian Journalists' Code of Ethics. This code sets high standards for professional reporting, giving concrete guidelines necessary to ensure objectivity and fairness. One of the most important sections of the Code, section III, refers to the prevention of corruption and conflict of interest, including prevention from the direct involvement of journalists in political parties and advocacy organizations:

“Work in PR and marketing agencies, lobbying agencies, public bodies and institutions, and political parties are incompatible with the profession.

Guidelines:

• Participation in a political, electoral or media campaign (political parties/companies, and others) cannot be performed simultaneously with journalistic/editorial work. The political activity of the family members of journalists/editors could also cause a real or apparent conflict of interest.”

Istinomer has created its own Rules on prevention of conflict of interest document, available on their page within the “about” section. According to the rules, Istinomer's journalists and employees are forbidden from becoming members or activists of political parties. 

Istinomer is also a member of the Serbian Press Council, a self-regulatory body and as a member organization, it is obliged to respect and actively promote the Serbian Journalists' Code of Ethics.

Istinomer fact-checks include proofs and relevant links used during the checking process.

The relevance of the source used in the fact-check is explained in the article. According to the randomised sample, Istinomer uses relevant and credible sources.

Istinomer uses documents, experts' comments, reports and publicly available information and cross-checks them with other available sources.

Istinomer is a fact-checking initiative of the non-governmental organization Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability, CRTA, which can be seen in the registration document attached below.

Istinomer is an independent media outlet founded by the NGO Center for Research, Transparency and Accountability, CRTA.                                                                                                           

https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/

Within the "about" section on Istinomer's website, their legal status, founder and funding details are available. Istinomer states that their work is solely funded through grants and are operating as a non-profit organization.

On the “About Istinomer” page (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/) readers are informed that Istinomer is edited by a team of journalists who gather and build a database of public officials’ and politicians’ statements, analyze and compare those statements, evaluate them according to the criteria of truthfulness, consistency and fulfillment of promises. Each rating given by a journalist is additionally checked by another journalist, a journalist-editor and Istinomer’s editor-in-chief.

The editor-in-chief is appointed by the CRTA organization, which is the Istinomer founder.

The editor-in-Chief is completely free and independent in conducting editorial policy and creating content on Istinomer. 

As stated on Istinomer's website, the editor-in-chief is appointed by the CRTA organization, a founder of the fact-checking platform. "The editor-in-chief is completely free and independent in conducting editorial policy and creating content on Istinomer," a web page reads.

Biographies of the team members are published within the "Impressum" page on the Istinomer website (see the link https://www.istinomer.rs/redakcija/).

 

Names and short biographies of Istinomer team members are published in the Impressum within the Editorial section. 

Readers are invited (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/) to suggest new topics through comments, via e-mail or tools such as “Proveri me” extension for web browsers or Istinomer button placed on Danas and N1 websites. In this way, statements for fact-checking are easily sent to the Istinomer team. 

Readers may suggest new topics through comments on social media and the web page, via e-mail or tools such as “Proveri me” [Check me] extension for web browsers or the Istinomer button on Danas and N1 websites.

On the “About Istinomer’ page (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/) is explained that there are three main criteria the Istinomer team is using for selecting statements for fact-checking and evaluation: that the statement contains verifiable fact, that it has been published in a number of different media and that is of public interest.

Istinomer readers may also find the general explanation on how Istinomer works and more details on the methodology and rating system in the 'About' section. Istinomer has three categories of ratings - truthfulness (scale from true to false), consistency (scale from consistent to inconsistent) and promises (scale from promise kept to not even started). All the ratings are followed by short and simple explanations, which enable readers to understand core methodology.

Selection of the clams for the fact checks is made at the editorial meetings. The Istinomer team usually chooses recent claims, important statements where there is a strong public interest and never fact-checks claims only to prove someone was wrong. Istinomer examines something if journalists believe there is a demand for verified facts on a certain topic.

The criteria and methodology used in the fact-checking process are explained in details within Istinomer's "about" section.

Seems like Istinomer chooses fact-checks based on their relevance and reach. However, it's not specifically explained within the article itself. Based on the methodology published on their website, the editorial team reviews proposals coming from readers, and are responsible for the final decision on which topics deserve the attention.

Istinomer uses various sources, both those confirming the thesis and the ones undermining it.

The same merits apply in all fact-checks. However, most of the space is given to members of the ruling coalition and so-called social media influencers sharing propaganda and fake news.

"Proveri me!" (Fact-check Me!) extension for web browsers enables readers of the most popular and most influential Serbian news portals to easily and with just one click communicate with Istinomer journalists and to suggest specific politicians’ and public officials’ statements or potentially false information from news and media articles for the Istinomer fact-checking. (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-fektcekingu/proveri-me/)

Also, as a result of established cooperation with the Danas daily (danas.rs) and cable network, TV N1 (rs.n1info.com) the Istinomer team succeed to post the "Istinomer button" on these websites and provide their readers with easy to use fact-checking function. Every page on Danas and N1 websites has a field readers can use to propose the topics and statements to the Istinomer team. Although this is a handy solution for readers, in many cases they still fail to send proper statements for fact-checking that fit Istinomer’s criteria and methodology. They either don't send quotes or send quotes where people are expressing their point of view, which Istinomer does not fact check. Therefore, most demands that are in accordance with Istinomer’s methodology that we receive from our readers come through email or social media channels - Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

Istinomer promotes the option of submitting fact-check proposals on their website, and through their partnership with N1 and Danas. As stated in their application, the most popular way of suggesting topics and fact-check ideas is through the "Proveri me" [Check me] browser extension.

In its correction policy published at https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/, Istinomer admits that it may make mistakes in its work but would never miss the opportunity to correct inaccurate or imprecise articles after the mistake was done. Istinomer also states that politicians or political parties called out in the Istinomer fact-checks are welcome to provide additional explanations, challenge the given assessments or additionally shed light on the problems from their point of view. Istinomer admits and corrects every mistake it makes, in accordance with the Code of Journalists of Serbia and the Law on Public Information and Media, which defines in detail the journalists’ obligations on the manner and deadlines of publishing of different types of corrections.

Although texts on the Internet can be “easily” edited and corrected, as a rule, Istinomer marks every update of the text, either with new information or by rectifying incorrect information.

If they notice a mistake in the ratings or articles published on the Istinomer website, readers are invited to report it to Istinomer journalists at office@istinomer.rs.

Istinomer's correction policy is available within their "about section". It is clear and easy to understand. Stakeholders and readers are invited to send their comments, additional proofs or explanations through email or other platforms used to communicate with readers.

Istinomer correction policy is fair and in accordance with the Serbian Code of Ethics for journalists, and is defined by the media laws. Readers or affected parties can easily request correction via email.

In the previous six months, Istinomer corrected or updated articles with additional information, upon readers’ or persons’ who were subjects of the fact-checks requests. Below are examples:

https://www.istinomer.rs/izjava/vuciceva-ustavna-nadleznost-da-odlucuje-o-sastavu-vlade-srbije/

https://www.istinomer.rs/facebook-provere/vakcinacija-kineskom-vakcinom-nije-stopirana/

https://www.istinomer.rs/analize/sta-koristimo-za-dezinfekciju-i-koliko-je-to-opasno/

Below each of the amended articles, there is a disclaimer indicating what was the intervention after the article was published.

On its “About Istinomer’ page (https://www.istinomer.rs/o-istinomeru/), readers are informed that Istinomer is a member of the International Fact-Checking’s Network and respects the IFCN Code of principles, including details on how they can complain in case they notice the non-compliance of the IFCN code. 

Within Istinomer's "about" section, readers are informed that the outlet is an IFCN signatory and how they can notify them in case they suspect that the IFCN code has been violated.