I was thinking about this so figured I'd post it in this group. Misinformation is everywhere. Misinformation is like a virus. How do you counteract misinformation? First, you need to have a trusted source(s). A source where you trust the information you are getting is reliable.
What are some trusted sources you use?
Misinformation infects society like a virus. Once a person has been infected there is often no cure.
The role of intelligence communities is to gather useful information aka intelligence. There are stages
Collection:- gather information
collation:- sort it so similar and related information is together
dissemination:- get it to people who know what they are looking at/ for.
analysis:- analyse identifying possible margins of error, biases etc
dissemination (again):- get it out to those who can use it. Intelligence aka useful information is useless if not passed on. It's a bit of a game of probabilities how accurate it is and how much weight you attach to it.
So rather than rely on limited trusted sources, source as much info as possible and then sift through it, actively looking for bias. The most useful information can crop up in unexpected places.
It helps to do a bit of self reflection and acknowledge your own biases before analysing. We all have them
Ed interpretation is in there too, important. My bad, been awhile
I refer you to @racocn8 in the first instance.
Additionally, I cross reference reports from different sources for consistency. I give much more credence to peer-reviewed publications on matters such as Covid-19 than I do to either Faux News or the rabble of anti-vaxxers. A rudimentary understanding of physics, technology, immunology, epidemiology and statistics also helps: the claims of microchips inside Covid-19 vaccines is manifestly absurd, as are the claims people such as BDair.
The reliability of information is always a matter of probability. Even information from reliable sources can be wrong or subject to tampering. Where did the information come from and does the source have a motive? I like Wikipedia, but I've seen mistakes/tampering. For a while, Wikipedia stated that Malaysia Flight 17 was shot down by Ukraine militia, when it was pretty clear initially and thereafter that Russian forces did it.
Countering misinformation is a matter of marshaling reliable references and presenting them. Some people will keep an open mind, but others become loyal to their views no matter what you show them. Confirmation bias is a powerful pattern.
Reliability of references is not necessarily a matter of 'scientific' or 'academic' publishing. Thomas Sowell publishes all manner of trash, and conservatives cite it like it was anything other than propaganda because Sowell is a professor. Conservative Institutions often generate inflammatory screeds with all sorts of statistics, and conservatives cite this crap, regardless of it's absurdity. Yeah, beware of statistics. You can't win any arguments when they've memorized a few, and one really can't be fact-checking statistics in a casual conversation.