Fake News Domains Can Be Deleted Early.

• Position: MACHINE LEARNING

A machine learning tool has been developed that identifies new domains created to promote false information so that they can be stopped before the "fake news" is spread through social media and online channels. To counter the proliferation of false information, it is important to move fast, before the creators of the information begin to post and broadcast fake news across multiple channels.

"Many models that predict false information use the content of articles or behaviors on social media channels to make their predictions," says Anil R. Doshi, assistant professor in the School of Management at University College London. "By the time that data is available, it may be too late. These producers are nimble and we need a way to identify them early. By using domain registration data, we can provide an early warning system using data that is arguably difficult for the actors to manipulate. Actors who produce false information tend to prefer remaining hidden and we use that in our model."

By applying a machine-learning model to domain registration data, the tool correctly was able to identify 92% of the false information domains and 96.2% of the nonfalse information domains set up in relation to the 2016...