Wrote: Fatbardh Dema
In the information ecosystem, we often encounter articles that are published with misleading titles.
Among them are headlines that do not clarify the location of the event, leaving room for misinformation among readers.
Hibrid.info has covered hundreds of such articles that used headlines and photographs that did not clarify where the events took place.
We bring you three such examples of these articles treated by hibrid.info and assessed as "Clickbait".
"Shocking case, 14-year-old girl raped by 12 people. 11-year-old was a guard," is the title of an article published by the Albanian-language portal "oranews.tv".
This article was also published on this portal's Facebook page.RTV ORA". In this post, this page has managed to collect a total of 161 reactions and 26 comments. (see photo below)
What's wrong with this article?
After clicking on this article, the news is clarified by stating that the event occurred in Belgium.
Based on the comments left by readers on this post, it is noticeable that most of them have fallen prey to this misleading title, implying that the event took place in one of the Albanian-speaking countries. (see here)
Another article published by the Albanian language portal "Albeu.com" is titled "Tragic accident/ Bus overturns, 10 people die, 36 others are injured". The article was also published on Facebook by this portal's page "Albeu.com".
This post, as of the writing of this article, has accumulated a total of 274 reactions and 30 comments. (see photo below)
What's wrong with this article?
The title of this article does not clarify where the incident took place, and the news is only clarified in the content, which states that the incident occurred in Iran.
Most commentators have criticized the portal in question for not clarifying in the title where the event took place. (see here)
The next portal "Prishtina01.com" had published an article titled "Massacre: One Person Breaks Into Nursing Home, Kills Five People."
The article was also found published on Facebook by the page "Pristina Newspaper", which garnered 23 reactions and 5 comments. (see photo below)
What's wrong with this article?
Only after clicking on the article does the content clarify that the event took place in Croatia.
What is “Clickbait”?
"Clickbait" are evaluated those informative contents whose title is general and does not disclose the location of the event, context and relevance. Such texts and articles aim to attract the attention of the audience with sensational titles with misleading consequences, which do not precisely clarify the content of the article. "Clickbait" titles are mainly made to attract readability in the case of media publications and/or to earn from clicks in the case of commercial publications.