the end unscrews to leave a compartment useful for a coded message perhaps. or some sort of suicide pill. what sort of person buys it? people who buy this stuff are historians. they are keeping it for historical, to keep the story of these people alive. edward toms, who is now 96 and lives in hythe, was attached to both the sas and the special operations executive during world war ii. we all had buttons that could be used as compasses. the soe laboratory was in the natural history museum museum cellar and it was where all these gadgets were being invented and tested. murderous weapons may not be everybody‘s cup of tea, not least as the auction takes place on valentine's day, but the collection is expected to go for thousands of pounds. fascinating stuff. i wonder what a

weather forecaster has in his collection. just a bit of seaweed. the seaweed is indicating something a lot milder early next week. something to look forward to for those of you who do not like the cold. tonight the chilly easterly wind. there is snow over the high ground. a cold night with temperatures hovering just above freezing in most places. over the hills we will have some ice around four. tomorrow, more of the same. cold, windy and grey. further rain, sleet and snow. high levels could be badly affected. not much brightness. the best in the far north west of scotland. a chilly three, 4 degrees. things do start to warm up, particularly through the early part

of next week. in the sunshine for some of a hello. this is bbc news. the headlines... president trump says he's considering a "brand new" executive travel order after his initial attempt was overturned by the federal courts. a group of conservative mps have called on the government to make the uk more welcoming for commonwealth citizens and make visa rules fast—tracked for visitors from the 52 nations. campaigners led by the labour peer lord dubs have delivered a petition signed by 50,000 people to downing street, urging

theresa may to allow more unaccompanied child refugees into britain. labour has issued formal warning to members of its front—bench team who disobeyed jeremy corbyn's order to vote for brexit. the mps won't be sacked but they have been asked not to do it again. more news at the top of the hour. now on bbc news, talking business. hello from washington, dc. i'm michelle fleury. did false stories have an impact on the outcome of the recent us election? ever since that question came up, fake news has become, well, front—page news. so, what should be done? on this week's talking business, we examine how fake news is spread and what, if anything, should be done to rein it in. welcome to the programme. i'm

michelle fleury in washington, dc. from politics to the media to technology companies, lately a lot of people worked up about fake news for the back of the spreading of lies or half—truths presented as news. the problem is made worse because there is money to be made in the fake news business. this is how it works. so, who is responsible for the boom, and the containment of fake news? here to help me investigate, we'rejoined from san francisco by a web and technology writer and pa rt—time entrepreneur.

in the studio with me are the director of the museum in washington, as well as a wikipedia editor for washington, dc. gentlemen, thank you very muchjoining me. if i could start a question, andrew, to you... how should we be defining fake news? i talked about it as being about lies presented as news. is that too narrow a definition? it is too broad a definition in many ways. one of the problems with the term fake news is it encompasses many different types of news sources, websites, you find. so, i think, one of the better pieces written about this, to try to break down the whole phenomenon of fake news into folks that might be intentionally creating news for profit, so we saw there were some operations out of macedonia that did this in the us election cycle.

you have partisan sites, who have sites which are not prey were checked in terms of facts. a whole bunch of different sites that fall under this umbrella of fake news. it's important to understand there are different motivations for these. it is hard to paint everything as one fake news phenomenon. i see you looking there. jeffrey. do you agree with that? i do. i think we're only very early in this news ecosystem where there are lots of different entrance. that is great in many ways. a lot more people have their voices heard. a lot more news sources. but it also opens this up to the possibility of people deliberately polluting was sabotaging the news. i think that's a long—term concern in many ways but it's been brought about, been highlighted, in recent times because the speed and velocity of social media. i want to bring you in there. you heard about the speed and velocity of social media is what it has accelerated this. do you agree with that? i do indeed. i think fake news, as andrew

defined, or tried to define, is actually the right way to think about it. we have fake news coming out of places like macedonia, which is essentially no different from spam. the rest of it is essentially propaganda and now propaganda is happening at network scale. i think that is the reality of the news ecosystem right now, that it works at a much faster pace and a much larger scale than it used to. so, it kind of blurs the boundaries between real and fake and real and unreal, and truths and half truths. who are the gatekeepers? i think part of the new era is that there are no gatekeepers at the moment. it used to be only a generation ago that you would have water kronkyte, and a few other anchors, and few in the united states very well

respected national newspapers that would deem for people. this is likely to be true, this is likely not to be. now, for all kinds of good reasons, those gatekeepers have been torn down and we have a much more vibrant and dynamic news system. in the early days of this new era, we don't have the gatekeepers. in many ways, it's going to be up to the individual now. to bea to be a much more intentional news coi'isuitiei’ to be a much more intentional news consumer than in the past. aren't you letting off the platforms, the facebooks and googles of the world, a bit too easily? i think they have a role. i think they are now beginning to acknowledge their new role in this information ecosystem, that they're just not pipes by which they distribute information and posts to people, but that they mediate, they edit, curated the news in a particular type of way. at the end of the day, i think that the social media platforms can do a significant

amount that it is really on the demand side. if consumers demand good quality news, the algorithms and the platforms are provided to them. one thing that the traditional gatekeepers have to do is to make themselves relevant in a new age of technology and social media. as was mentioned, things are happening faster on social media, they're happening shorter. the most important thing is uncontextualised. these are tweets, these are instagram posts, they are facebook utterances and they are not 3000—5000 word pieces. in isolation, in little bits, in part of the internet. what you are seeing are some experiments, like the washington post for example, right after the election. it says we are providing a new plug—in for the chrome browsers. so, whenever you look at a tweet from donald trump, were going to put a little fact checked right underneath it saying, what is the truth value of this?

not too many people will use this, obviously. how many people are using a chrome desktop browser and are installing the washington post plug—in? it's kind of interesting they are experimenting with these types of things. we have also seen that google and facebook have realised that just being a platform, and just link sharing with no responsibility, is also not a great thing. they are almost what we call accidental or unintentional media organisations. because they are sharing the news but they are not doing the fact checking orflagging of content in a way that we see as being effective. a lot of the moves we are seeing from facebook and google right now, annotating and flagging trying to get more information from the reader because readers are demanding that now. i slightly disagree with andrew. i do believe the new gatekeepers are the social media platform. they cannot deny that is their role. they have to make sure that nefarious information does not spread. they need to figure out the stuff coming out of places like macedonia, the for profit spam sites should be stopped right away — they have

the infrastructure to do that. the fact they did not do it tells me they dropped the bar. even just to kind of say that we are looking into the fake news, i think it is a lot of lip service. in their universe, more attention to whatever people are doing, or reading on their platform, equals more profit. i want to talk about the decentralisation of news. from rolling news, two technology companies becoming big—time media players. how much of a role has that played in what we have seen today? i think we see the abundance of news sites. in many ways this is the golden age of news. more people have access to more sites and more information than ever before, if they are willing to undertake the very mild search clause. if they just want to be passive and have things come at them, it's a real problem.

i agree that the technology companies have a role. i don't want teenagers in macedonia flooding our news system with false news. i don't want to assign too much authority to facebook and google. they are for—profit companies. they are doing what's best for their shareholders. that is what they should do. but the algorithmically—derived results they produce are not particularly transparent and no one elected them to become the gatekeepers for the news ecosystem. i think they have a role. i don't think you can mitigate the responsibility that individuals have with all this access, we're now going to have to pay attention to what we consume. thank you all for now. later in the programme, can algorithms help wipe out fake news? algorithms help determine which stories take precedence over others on your facebook news feed. our comedy consultant has been taking a closer look. in this week's talking point, he examines the role played

by algorithms in fake news. fake news. you've probably seen it written more than you heard it said. usually written by someone on facebook shouting virtually at someone they used to like. now, sometimes people shout fake news in a facebook comment purely because they disagree with the previous facebook comment. but, real fake news, if you know what i mean, that's where a company, orjust two guys with a laptop, set up a website that looks like a plausible news website and churn out stories that looks sort of possible. how does that fake news and those made up stories get onto your social media feeds? a former vice president at intel here in ireland and something of a tech and start—up guru tells me it's something to do with algorithms. the beauty of algorithms is they neither know, nor care, what is true or false. it's mathematics.

it's looking for correlations. likewise, in the news space, if there are news articles which are being clicked on out there and people with interests like mine are looking at real news items, they are looking at false news items that they are looking at who knows what news items. as far as the algorithm is concerned, this is a high hit rate. for somebody like philip, so i'm going to present that to him. cats, they're just so funny. wouldn't you think though that rational thinking human beings will do little bit of verification on the stories that they are served up on their news feeds? turns out it's not even a cat. the problem is, we don't do that verification. we're too happy to have our vices confirmed so when we see something plausible on our phones we just share it. so, controlling fake news is going to have to be done in a different way. hello. i'm the ceo of of fact matter. fact matter is a google—backed project for automated fact checking.

our mission is to solve misinformation in online content. solving online misinformation sounds like a noble cause, but how are they going to do it? we're focusing on sentence level fact checking. this is identifying claims that appear in text and verifying those claims. machine intelligence comes in using natural language processing, to understand effectively what is a claim. what are the sources that you could use to check that claim — what that claim is about and the hardest part, which is linking that claim to a fact. it will be a browser extension which allows you to see highlighted sentence level claims about statistics and it will link them to sources that, for example, the world bank, it will enable them to verify those claims immediately. fact checking, spoilsports. our extension could basically look at a piece of content and say this is likely to be misleading because, overall, this piece of news contains ten, 15, 20 misleading claims.

the only problem with this solution is it may not be able to tell the difference between fake news and when someone is just trying to be funny, which is a problem i face myself quite often. touching on the role of algorithms in fake news for that you can see more of his short films on our website. back here in washington, in the rapid and seemingly uncontrollable spread of fake news, modern technology as part of the problem. could it also turn out to be part of the solution? i'm joined again by our guests. doctor geoffrey from the museum, professor andrew lee of wikipedia and the technology writer from san francisco. let's talk about... if i could talk about algorithms. are we right to blame algorithms for the problem of fake news? you know, algorithms only do what we

specified. they are just a set of instructions we have written. hopefully got up with machine learning there are all types of things happening we may not know of. it is about the machine making determinations without human eye balls determinations without human eyeballs double—checking them or steering them. we had a problem recently where google was giving search results for, did the holocaust happen with some very unsavoury sites at the top of those rankings? google has repeatedly over the years said, sorry, that is our algorithm. if you want to see something different at the top, they're going to have to go on the internet and make it happen on the internet. google did tweet the algorithm at the end of the day so holocaust the mars were not at the top of the search results. i'm sympathetic to the companies. they have to recognises his very early oi'i. have to recognises his very early

on. three or four macro years ago i do not think facebook was thinking, we are going to become the platform by which most millennial is get the i'iews by which most millennial is get the news was that i do not think that was in their heads. it has happened at such a speed and has caused a significant change in demands facing the to respond. we also have to recognise these are companies unlike any we have ever seen in that they are truly global. the next million customers of facebook weather will probably be in south asia, africa and east asia. they have to be responsive to all of that but also. we rightly demand more of the companies. i am quite sympathetic.” respectfully disagree with you. facebook had specifically targeted the media, the news business. they replicated the idea of twitter

because they knew that is how people keep coming back to the facebook platform. news is one of the most addictive things for people to come back to a platform or a service or a brand. they intentionally went ahead and targeted the news business. between google and facebook, 85% of the online advertising are going to these two companies. these are not, babes in the woods. they are private equities. private entities have responsibilities. it is notjust facebook. facebook, google, twitter, microsoft, which owns the being said engine and other entities like them need to sit down and figure out what is the right answer. i don't think

the individual should bear the burden of trying to make decisions on every single piece of information they access on facebook or any other service. i want to bring in andrew. wikipedia was mentioned. you are keen to jump wikipedia was mentioned. you are keen tojump in. what is the role for wikipedia and the role free humans? wikipedia has been around fori6 humans? wikipedia has been around for 16 years when it first started in 2001. it was seen as an odd experiment on the side of the internet. you are not sure if you could trust it. it has been in the top ten most visited website in the world. wikipedia has stayed at the top. there are debates of how much you should trust it that we have found that over the years it is still the go to place, including folks like google whom i knit for information. every time you do a google search you will find

references to wikipedia. facebook and google are employing people who are learning from wikipedia lesson. when you read an article will see a warning or the neutrality of a section is disputed. we need morsels is to verify this. wikipedia has said, this is the best we know of this topic. we could use better sourcing and better facts. this topic. we could use better sourcing and betterfacts. facebook in germany is trying out this experiment of annotating and putting warnings around content. not necessarily saying this is true or untrue but to give more guidance to the reader. what do you think of the idea of crowd sourcing? all of these things should be implied. this is so compensated and it is so early, frankly, in the new ecosystem that we should be testing all of these things out. on the supply side, i think the platforms should do more. i think the responsibility of

citizens also has to be explored. the wikipedia example is a good one. the wikipedia example is a good one. the point it has lasted more than most tech start—ups or most tech company shows that people who provide a service with the public respect and demand that there is a market out there. wikipedia is a financial model. i think we will have to explore all of these things. what we have seen in two or three years if there will become more clashes that they will become more sophisticated. what do you think about sites who debunk fake news?m is like racing a human against a jet plane. that is what we are dealing with. fake news is happening at that scale and fact checking at human scale. we will always have that problem. i am all for it. scale. we will always have that

problem. iam all for it. if scale. we will always have that problem. i am all for it. if we find ourselves here a year from now having this conversation, what do you think would be talking about when it comes to this issue?” you think would be talking about when it comes to this issue? i would say we will be talking about the same issue. the problem is much bigger. other platforms are still dragging theirfeet. bigger. other platforms are still dragging their feet.” bigger. other platforms are still dragging their feet. i agree we will still be talking about the problems. i think we will be a little bit more focused on crises and how public opinion can be manipulated in short duration, high stake crises where many of the safeguards we are talking about which may work over a few days and weeks will be useless when there is an issue like this was the back is what concerns me the most. can we, as a society, or other societies be played in an economic crisis? all the things we have been talking about work better with time. we're not there yet in terms of an immediate response to a deliberate

destabilisation. can you get this to work at scale? we know that the classic quote, i could go halfway around the world before the truth gets its shoes on foot or can you make networks of annotation that fa ct make networks of annotation that fact checking, that get the good signal to consumers quicker and in a more useful way question what it is a big challenge. twitter is a platform that is proprietary closed, facebook is closed. will they work together to combat fake and inaccurate information question about right now wikipedia does it. that is where things end. there are little things going on like the washington post but are they going to work together? i am not so sure. i look forward to revisiting this at another time. goodbye from all of us here in the studio. that is it from

this edition of talking business. next week tania beckett will be in london talking about how browns can survive in an iraq of algorithms and fa ke survive in an iraq of algorithms and fake content. for now, it is goodbye. if you are fed up with this cold weather, there is a hint at the end of this broadcast that something more spring light might be on the horizon. some sunshine today but you had to go quite a way to find it. for many of us it was cold and bleak. there was a coating of snow across the chilterns. a mixture of rain and snow. most of us in countering rain and snow across the high ground. into the night some of the snow on the lower levels in heavy bursts as the temperature it

uses heavy bursts as the temperature it uses down a touch. the pennines and the peak district are most prone. temperatures are hovering just above freezing in most places will stop up over the hills we could see some iciness around. not a very warming start to the day. if you are heading out first thing in the morning, cloudy, grey and damp. the high—level routes will be the worst affected. across northern ireland and scotland non—batch in the way of rain, sleet and snow. the far north west of scotland will do the best for sunshine. for the rest of us, another grey day. there will be dampness around and some snow. becoming mostly confined to the highest ground of wales, the peak district and the pennines again. becoming dry across the southern can tease. temperatures struggling again

once more. some spots around three, four degrees. in the wind it will feel colder than that. more rugby taking place in paris. scotland are taking place in paris. scotland are taking on france. on monday it will be even windier. the good old gale blowing across western coasts and heels, —— hills. a big change in the weather. it will feel much more lively across the southern half of the uk. we are going to lose the cold est the uk. we are going to lose the coldest of the weather through next week. still the wind. that would be a factor. it will not warm up dramatically initially. temperatures will be on the rise. by the middle of the week 10 degrees with some sunshine should feel much more impressive. that is something to look forward to. more details online. this is bbc world news today, broadcasting in the uk and around the world. president trump says he won't give

up on his travel ban — and could submit new legislation in the coming days. we will win that battle but we have other options. clashes in the iraqi capital, baghdad over government corruption — have left at least five people dead. at least six people die and dozens are injured as a powerful earthquake hits the philippines. and another group of whales is stranded on a beach in new zealand. it comes after 300 died in the same bay on friday.