Press agencies as fact-checking tools in media education on disinformation – a case study of the TASR in comparison with the APA

Quality journalistic work based on strategies for consistent verification of information and external fact-checking activities of media professionals play an important role in suppressing the occurrence and dissemination of disinformation in the online space, and in the recovery of the information ecosystem as part of a wider social space. Therefore, the emerging support initiatives of media institutions, especially key centers of accumulation and distribution of information in the media space related to fact-chcecking, are significant. Fact-checking is also a special tool for the development of media competences in the process of media education. Media education as a teaching about the media and their phenomena is considered to be one of the core educational mechanisms of "immunization" against fake news, and an activator of the critical approach preventing their occurrence. The focus of this study is to present the results of qualitative-quantitative research, based on the analysis and comparison of two case studies – web platforms of press agencies focused on fact-checking. A particular research intention was to find out how they are becoming a tool of media education on disinformation. This is in line with the core categories of media competence development with an emphasis on the development of critical thinking. A case was the Press Agency of the Slovak Republic (TASR) in cooperation with the French press agency AFP and their platform Hoax servis, and APA-Faktenchecks of the Austrian press agency.