Facebook, Comic Republic unveil online book to tackle fake news

• Transporters want security agencies to hunt perpetrators

Social Media platform, Facebook and Comic Republic have announced the launch of #NoFalseNewsZone online comic book, an educational comic series designed to help people think critically about the messages they see and read online.

The series helps readers to identify false news and what they can do to help minimise its spread. The online comic book, which comes in a three-part series, will feature stories of an experienced nurse, an intern reporter and a university student who are on their personal journey to educate people on how to curb false news, and also join the fight against misinformation to help create a #NoFalseNewsZone online.

Facebook’s Corporate Communications Manager for Anglophone West Africa, Oluwasola Obagbemi, said Facebook is excited to launch its #NoFalseNewsZone online comic book in collaboration with Comic Republic.

“Our hope is that with this online comic book, people will make informed decisions by thinking critically about what they read, trust and share,” Obagbemi said.

Comic Republic CEO, Jide Martin, said: “In a world where we are online for everything essential, it is now critical that we protect our new reality. I urge people to read and pass it on but most of all, really think before you share unverified messages with contacts.”

MEANWHILE, inter-state luxury bus owners and operators have called on the Nigerian Police Force and other security agencies to investigate sources of frequent hoax online news reports about hijack of their vehicles and kidnap of passengers by armed bandits.

The transporters were reacting to the latest in a series of fake news, which claimed that a fully loaded Abuja-bound luxury bus belonging to GUO Transport Co. Ltd was intercepted in Edo by bandits suspected to be Fulani, who kidnapped about 123 passengers on board, hours after departing Owerri.

Describing the story, which was widely publicised online, as a mischievously fabricated falsehood, Managing Director, GUO Transport Co. Ltd, Maduabuchukwu Okeke, said neither was any of his company’s buses hijacked, nor the passengers abducted.

He urged the Department of State Services (DSS), the police and other law enforcement agencies to track down the perpetrators scaring away innocent long-distance road users and jeopardising luxury bus business.

Also, the recently elected National President, Association of Luxury Bus Owners of Nigeria (ALBON), Nonso Ubajaka, decried the frequent generation of falsehood about his members’ vehicles on the Internet. He appealed to law enforcement agencies to swing into action and apprehend the mischief-makers.