TheJournal.ie is a full participating member of the Press Council of Ireland, registered as a company as Journal Media Ltd in Ireland, Registration # 483623. The FactCheck project began in February 2016, and in September 2016 became a signatory to the International Fact-checking Network’s Code of Principles.

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

All archived fact checks can be found here: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck/news

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

Since our initial verification by the IFCN, we have continued expanding the breadth of our factchecking to better reflect what is influencing decision-making of the general public in Ireland. So as well as having factchecked (at this point) representatives of all political parties and groupings in the national parliament, we have applied factchecking to the broader sphere of viral posts on social media, public debates on health and social issues, and made concentrated efforts to ramp up factchecks on topics of urgency in the national arena - eg, impact of Brexit on Ireland and on the highly-contentious referendum on abortion legislation here.

On the latter in particular, it has been vital for us to prove our impartiality to our audience in order for our factchecks to have credibility in the face of a perception that the Irish media has been weighted towards one campaign or another in this referendum. To this end, we've factchecked claims from both campaigns and updated our errors and clarifications page (which is public-facing) if we have found newer information that calls into question any previous factcheck verdicts by us. See here: (http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-updates-and-corrections-2987705-Sep2016/).

In order to ensure consistency, FactCheck uses a prescribed set of verdicts, whose details and requirements are clearly defined and publicly available (http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-thejournal-ie-readers-guide-2987611-Sep2016/).

In the past year, we have also expanded our suite of products to include factfiles and reader-driven research answers to better cover the service we can provide on disinformation on the whole.

This selection of links is to show the focus on the recent referendum but also the scope of the rest of our work from economy to health to politics to viral content in the past year:

FactCheck finding popular claim from abortion No campaign to be untrue - http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-uk-ireland-abortion-law-4027157-May2018/

FactFind testing unclear numbers from abortion Yes campaign - http://www.thejournal.ie/how-many-doctors-support-repeal-4030792-May2018/

FactCheck debunking health abortion link meme that went viral for Irish users - http://www.thejournal.ie/does-abortion-increase-risk-of-breast-cancer-3994788-May2018/

Research piece to answer reader Qs on constitutionality of current legislation: http://www.thejournal.ie/fatal-foetal-abnormality-4-4003585-May2018/

FactCheck on a persistent Whatsapp scam our readers alerted us to in their droves: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-martinelli-virus-3968715-Apr2018/

FactCheck on media claims around a sensitive Brexit issue: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-passport-3766834-Dec2017/

FactCheck vindicating a claim from the unpopular (in Ireland) alcohol sales group: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-alcohol-bill-3690412-Dec2017/

FactCheck on a claim made by the Irish prime minister (he later had to retract his claim): http://www.thejournal.ie/fact-check-homeless-2-3693945-Nov2017/

FactCheck finding a claim on vaccinations made by a leading member of clergy to be misleading the debate: http://www.thejournal.ie/hov-bishop-factcheck-3620053-Sep2017/

FactCheck vindicating critics of government's housing policy but also contextualising the current crisis as having evolved from the 1980s in which that criticism was rooted: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-social-housing-ireland-then-and-now-3594254-Sep2017/

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

TheJournal.ie was founded in late 2010 with a stated mission to provide unbiased, independent news that informed users without agenda. Our motto 'read, share and shape the news' - evident on our homepage and repeated on our apps and mobile pages - is a public declaration that we are answerable to users of our service. This is supported by tech features such as 'submit tip' and 'make a correction' buttons on our apps which allows users to contact the newsroom and journalists directly.

Our hiring policy excludes members of political parties or lobbying groups from working in our newsroom and our editorial induction manual explicitly states that journalists must leave all personal sympathies at the door. The manual states that all information in a story must be verified independently with no information published elsewhere - online, etc - taken as established fact. We also have a policy of hyperlinking to sources (studies, academic papers etc) where we have verified these as independent and wholly trustworthy, for the purpose of transparency. All journalists are required to annotate sources and preserve interview notes for every story, and file them daily in a dated Google doc that can be accessed by a senior editor, should we need to review any aspect of a story we publish. These notes are preserved for at least a year.

Our journalists are also excluded from accepting "any fees, commissions or other inducements of any kind whatsoever from any third party which could create a conflict of interest or otherwise jeopardise or leave open to question the impartial discharge of the duties of your position".

We have a further stated policy in our editorial manual on journalists' use of both Journal Media social platforms and guidelines for use of personal social media accounts that are public facing, eg, "Are you displaying a bias that could diminish your authority to report on a particular subject or person?"

With specific reference to this, the editorial team led a series of meetings for reporters in advance of the current referendum in Ireland on abortion legislation to workshop the impact of personal bias or publicly-stated opinion by the team on public perception of our trustworthiness at a time when we propose to give information-led coverage to the campaign.

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

FactCheck’s Reader’s Guide (http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-thejournal-ie-readers-guide-2987611-Sep2016/), published in September 2016 and linked at the end of every subsequent fact check, contains sections providing details on our approach to finding and selecting claims to fact-check, as well as our policies and procedures on gathering and publishing evidence. Reviewing a handful of fact checks from the archives (http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck/news/) will show that we make heavy use of clear and complete citation and attribution of sources of evidence, as well as hyperlinks, and that we regularly include downloadable spreadsheets containing data relevant to that fact check.

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

TheJournal.ie is part of Journal Media Ltd (http://www.thejournal.ie/about-us/) which comprises four publications and and is wholly owned by online entrepreneurs Eamonn and Brian Fallon. Funding for Journal Media is provided by a capital investment by the Fallon brothers, who founded an Irish online property listings website called Daft.ie in 1997. The ownership of Journal Media is confirmed by documents filed at the Companies Registration Office in Ireland and can be accessed here: (https://cro.ie/) or can be supplied by us if needed. Journal Media also earns revenue from advertising on Journal Media sites - our advertising policy is publicly available here: http://www.thejournal.ie/advertising-policy/

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

TheJournal.ie FactCheck has moved from employing a sole factchecker to rolling out the project to the whole newsroom.

The project is directed by TheJournal.ie editor Susan Daly and deputy editor Christine Bohan. Biographies of each reporter and editor can be seen here: http://www.thejournal.ie/meet-the-team-thejournal-ie-factcheck-bios-4267874-Oct2018/

This link is included at the end of every article and the article can be seen in our FactCheck vertical. Each reporter's byline and links to their previous work also appear beneath each factcheck for which they are responsible. 

I believe that this section is very close to being compliant but doesn’t meet the requirements as detailed in the IFCN checklist. Initially, one staffer was the factchecker for the whole project, and now the site has expanded this role to journalists. That’s great.

But in its application, FactCheck says that it lists the biographies of all the newsroom staffers who work on the factcheck under this expanded role. But, I randomly picked a few factchecks to see those biographies and they aren’t there. Here’s a screenshot below of two of the authors of a factcheck (one about a virus impacting mobile phones)--it’s clear you can reach these staffers and see their Twitter pages but it doesn’t list the biographies.

Users can contact TheJournal.ie in a number of different ways - on the app 'send a tip' or 'make a correction' buttons mentioned above in this application, but also through the email 'news@thejournal.ie' or other sections here: http://www.thejournal.ie/contact/ Users can also tweet at us @thejournal_ie or DM us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/thejournal.ie/ To contact TheJournal.ie's FactCheck specifically, users can email their suggestions and corrections to factcheck@thejournal.ie or tweet or DM the project at @TJ_FactCheck - our reader guide outlines all of those options: http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-thejournal-ie-readers-guide-2987611-Sep2016/ We also opened a specific email channel for questions and factcheck requests around the abortion legislation referendum referendum@thejournal.ie As a full member of the Irish Press Council, we also subscribe to their complaint process where users can make a submission if they believe we have failed to uphold any principle in the Council's Code of Practice: http://presscouncil.ie/contact-us/

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

Our Reader’s guide (http://www.thejournal.ie/factcheck-thejournal-ie-readers-guide-2987611-Sep2016/) contains sections giving details of our methodology. You can read it here. 

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

We especially encourage readers to suggest fact checks, through a dedicated email address (factcheck@thejournal.ie), and a Twitter account (@TJ_FactCheck). We invite readers to submit claims in every published fact check, and through Twitter “call-outs” timed to coincide with primetime television and radio panel shows, as well as on an ad hoc basis, surrounding particular special events or developments. In this regard, we have aimed more recently to respond in realtime to users’ concerns and requests, for example on this Twitter thread from our main publication account related to a major live debate during the referendum: https://twitter.com/thejournal_ie/status/996416104229634048 We have established partnerships with three national radio/TV current affairs shows this year on which our factcheckers present factchecking slots - we publicise these on our social platforms in advance, in order to solicit user requests. (Partnerships are with Newstalk Radio’s afternoon show, and the Tonight Show and Pat Kenny Show on TV3 - https://twitter.com/TonightShowTV3/status/998652528597270528 https://twitter.com/SeanMoncrieff/status/996725677582901248 https://www.facebook.com/thejournal.ie/videos/1689943904359360/ In addition, where a fact check originated with a reader request, we mention this fact in the article, as well as (provided they have given consent) the name and locality of that reader. Our Reader’s Guide contains details on how readers can suggest fact checks, as well as some advice on the most suitable types of claims, what to avoid, and so on.

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

Our corrections policy, which also includes a list of corrections, is publicly available here (http://www.thejournal.ie/thejournal-ie-factcheck-corrections-policy-2987705-Sep2016/?jrnl_af=1), and is linked to at the end of each individual fact check. It is updated whenever a correction or update is made, and includes the date on which each correction is made. Each correction is also noted within the fact check in question. 

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements. 

A substantive correction was made to a verdict and content of a factcheck from March of last year on the admission policies and diversity of student body in Irish primary schools when it was discovered that we ad insufficiently examined a Department of Education report on the data pertaining to such. An apology was issued to the commentator whose claim had been examined, a correction made in our updates and correction and a prominent editor’s note left on the article itself: http://www.thejournal.ie/catholic-primary-schools-diversity-divestment-facts-ireland-3252590-Mar2017/ This correction was also pushed out on our social platforms which have a combined reach of 1.2 million users.

A shorter clarification was added to this factcheck of November 2016 to update assessment of a claim around the rate of abortions in the UK (http://www.thejournal.ie/yes-to-life-life-institute-8th-amendment-abortion-leaflet-facts-3058066-Nov2016/) to reflect deeper examination of those stats in a more recent factcheck that focused just on that issue (http://www.thejournal.ie/save-the-8th-poster-statistic-abortion-3951738-Apr2018/) 

The evidence submitted by the organization is fully compliant with IFCN requirements.