Why misinformation is becoming easier to believe than facts

Kathmandu, October 1, 2026 — The problem with misinformation is no longer simply that false information exists. The more difficult problem is that false information can sometimes feel more convincing than a carefully verified fact.

A fabricated video can be watched within seconds. A sensational claim can be repeated dozens of times across Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, X and messaging groups before a journalist or fact-checker has established what actually happened. By the time the correction arrives, the false version may already feel familiar.

That familiarity matters. A 2026 systematic review and meta-analysis covering 182 studies and more than 31,000 participants found a consistent “illusory truth effect”: repeated exposure makes statements seem more truthful, even when the statements are false. The researchers found the effect across different kinds of content, including news headlines and rumours.

This helps explain why simply telling people that something is false does not always solve the problem.

Misinformation has another advantage: it is often designed for attention rather than accuracy.

A complicated truth may require context. A false claim can be reduced to a sentence, a dramatic photograph or a 20-second video. Truth can begin with “it depends”; misinformation often begins with “this is what they don't want you to know.”

Social media platforms intensify that difference. The Reuters Institute’s 2026 Digital News Report says social media and video networks have become, on average across the markets studied, more popular sources of news than television and news organisations’ own websites and apps. At the same time, concern about misinformation has increased, with 62 percent of respondents saying they were concerned about fake news online.

This creates an uncomfortable contradiction: people may know that social media is unreliable while continuing to use it as a primary place to encounter information.

During the September 2025 Gen Z protests, social media became a crucial source of real-time information. It also became a channel through which rumours, recycled videos, exaggerated claims and fabricated stories spread rapidly. The Kathmandu Post documented false claims involving the Nepali Army, Pashupatinath Temple, political figures and alleged deaths. In one case, an old video of a religious festival was presented as footage of an incident at Pashupatinath.

The significance of such incidents is not merely that people believed individual false claims. They showed how quickly uncertainty can become misinformation when thousands of people are simultaneously searching for answers.

During a crisis, people are not necessarily sitting down to conduct a source audit. They are asking: What is happening? Is my family safe? Should I leave? Who is responsible? What happens next?

Fear shortens the distance between seeing information and sharing it.

The same episode also showed that misinformation does not only fool people who are supposedly “uneducated” or unfamiliar with digital media. The Kathmandu Post reported that false and speculative claims circulated within circles that included doctors, civil servants, civil society members and media professionals. Trust between people inside these smaller groups could make unverified claims more persuasive.

That is an important lesson for Nepal. Media literacy cannot simply mean teaching people how to identify a suspicious Facebook post. Even people who understand how misinformation works can be affected when information arrives during a stressful, emotionally charged situation.

Trust is another part of the problem.

When people have little confidence in institutions, news organisations or official communication, they may turn elsewhere. A person may believe a claim not because the evidence is strong, but because the person sharing it is someone they already trust.

That is particularly important in Nepal, where information gaps during crises can quickly become filled by social media speculation. Reporting after the 2025 protests found that delays or limited communication from formal authorities contributed to an information vacuum in which rumours and unverified claims flourished.

The answer, therefore, cannot be to simply tell citizens to “trust the authorities.” Trust has to be earned through timely, transparent and verifiable communication.

The problem becomes even more complicated with artificial intelligence.

A photograph is no longer automatically evidence that something happened. A video is no longer automatically evidence that someone said or did something. AI-generated images, manipulated videos, altered audio and fabricated screenshots can provide the appearance of evidence without the underlying event ever occurring.

Nepal's National Human Rights Commission said in its investigation into the September 2025 Gen Z movement that AI-generated images and videos, fake police social-media pages and compromised digital platforms were among the forms of technology misuse it identified.

This changes the basic question people need to ask online. Instead of only asking, “Does this look real?” they increasingly need to ask, “Where did this come from, and what independently confirms it?”

That distinction is becoming essential because misinformation is often not completely absurd. The most effective falsehoods can contain a fragment of reality.

There really may have been a protest. A real person may have been injured. A genuine photograph may exist. A real statement may have been made. The misinformation comes from attaching the wrong date, place, person, cause or interpretation to that real material.

That is why context matters as much as authenticity.

A real photograph can be used to tell a false story.

A genuine video can be given a false date.

A real statistic can be stripped of its source or denominator.

A genuine statement can be clipped until it appears to mean something entirely different.

Facts, meanwhile, have a structural disadvantage. Good journalism is slower because verification takes time. Reporters need to contact people, examine documents, establish chronology, identify locations and distinguish confirmed information from rumours.

That slower process can look weak in an environment that rewards speed.

Yet the solution is not to make journalism behave more like social media. It is to make verification more visible and accessible.

The Reuters Institute’s 2025 Digital News Report found that 58 percent of respondents across its 48 markets were concerned about distinguishing what is true from what is false online. When people wanted to check potentially false information, trusted news organisations, official sources and fact-checkers were among the sources most frequently identified.

For Nepal, that means news organisations also have a responsibility beyond publishing corrections after misinformation has already gone viral. Verification needs to be fast, understandable and available where people are actually consuming information.

Readers also have a role.

Before forwarding a dramatic claim, the simplest questions can sometimes prevent a falsehood from travelling further: Who originally reported this? When was this photograph or video created? Is there an identifiable source? Has another credible organisation independently confirmed it? Is the headline stronger than the evidence?

Most importantly, people should become comfortable with not knowing immediately.

That may be one of the hardest habits to develop in the digital age.

A blank space feels uncomfortable. “We don't know yet” feels unsatisfying. But uncertainty is not the same thing as falsehood. Sometimes refusing to fill an information gap with speculation is the most responsible response.

The deeper danger is not that people will believe one false Facebook post. It is that repeated exposure to contradictory claims can eventually make people believe nothing.

When every side appears to be lying, facts lose their authority. When every correction looks politically motivated, verification itself becomes suspect. When people stop believing that anything can be established with reasonable confidence, misinformation no longer needs to prove itself. It only needs to create doubt.

Nepal's experience during and after the 2025 protests demonstrated how quickly that environment can develop. It also showed that misinformation can move through ordinary social relationships, not just anonymous accounts or obvious conspiracy communities.

The challenge, then, is not simply to produce more facts.

It is to build an information environment in which verified facts can compete: where official institutions communicate quickly, journalists show their evidence, fact-checkers can reach audiences, platforms provide meaningful context, schools teach verification skills, and citizens resist the temptation to share something merely because it confirms what they already believe.

Facts may never be as fast, emotional or entertaining as misinformation.

But a society does not need every person to become an investigator. It needs enough people to develop one simple habit: pause before believing, and pause again before sharing.

In an age when seeing is no longer necessarily believing, verification has become part of being informed.

Why misinformation is becoming easier to believe than facts

Repetition, emotion, social media algorithms, weak information gaps and AI-generated content can make misinformation feel more credible, creating serious challenges for Nepal’s digital public sphere.

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