The trends of spreading rumours and fake news from the time of COVID-19 pandemic has increased vastly on social media websites. Government has time and again asked people not to believe anything until and unless the government officially declares it.
Recently, a tweet claiming that lockdown will be re-imposed again in the country from December 1 to contain the spread of coronavirus went viral. However, this turned out to be misinformation and the government gave further gave clarification on the same.
PIB, in a tweet wrote, ”A tweet allegedly posted by a prominent media outlet claims that due to the growing number of #COVID19 cases in the country, the Govt. is going to re-impose a nationwide lockdown from 1st December #PIBFactCheck: This tweet is #Morphed. No such decision has been taken by the Govt.”
The Press Information Bureau (PIB) launched this fact-checking wing in December 2019, to curb misinformation and fake news prevalent on the internet. The objective of PIB is “to identify misinformation related to government’s policies and schemes that are circulating on various social media platforms”.