Singaporean ministers can decide what is fake news
And then order websites and social media firms to delete it
AS SINGAPORE GRAPPLES with the first cases of local transmission of the Wuhan virus, its government is also worried about another form of contagion: fake news. The two are not unrelated. In late January a Singaporean website claimed that someone in the city-state had died of the virus, when no one has to date. And two Facebook posts claimed, wrongly, that a train station had been closed and cleaned because an infected person had been there.
This article appeared in the Asia section of the print edition under the headline “The ministries of truth”
From the February 8th 2020 edition
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