What role can blockchain technologie play to avoid fakenews in the mainstream media #dutchmediaweek

Why would media companies and consumers be interested in applications of blockchain? There are three experts here that will talk about developments within blockchain and how media companies can make use of that. On my right side is Sebastiaan van der Lans founder of WordProof. We also have Marko van Kampen creative director at DPG Media, De Persgroep. To talk about how a big publisher uses blockchain and what kind of ideas they have. And we also have… Joost de Valk, founder and CPO, Chief Product Officer, at Yoast.

00:34 - They make a plug-in for Search Engine Optimization. This is being used by 11 million websites. Let’s start with Sebastiaan. The European Commission has granted you one million euros. - That’s right. - Out of hundreds of submissions. And you have won that award. WordProof aims to fight fake news, fraud and privacy issues through blockchain technology. Practically, how does it work? What we do is: we timestamp information.

01:00 - Through this you can indicate that you haven’t messed with it. It’s as simple as that. So we say: the internet has offered us so many things, just one click of a button and we get a taxi at the door. However, at the same time it has its flaws. the biggest one is reliability. That’s logical, because the internet was built to connect computers to computers. Computers do not dream, they do not care about power or self-enrichment. But people do.

01:24 - - Right, the algorithms behind it are optimized to do so. - Exactly. These obnoxious traits people have can now triumph on the internet. So you get fraud, manipulation and theft. What we do is to insert trust into the DNA of the internet. That sounds wonderful, But actually, what you do is: when I read an article I can click on little thing below. Much like one of those little locks. And then I know that this article still is the same as it was originally published. - That’s one thing.

01:50 - But another thing is: how has it developed over time? What were the previous versions, if the publisher want this. At De Persgroep we’re currently running on one title. That’s what we do. Bringing trust to the internet. So that the consumer is able to check: How has it changed? Who’s the sender of the information? Is it really coming from the politician, the journalist, these people? A practical application for blockchain for the media. Let’s see. Marko van Kampen, creative director of DPG Media, he actually has one of the titles, he uses your service. Marko is a bit of a visionary. He was really… when he was occupied with blockchain, he had a white paper with no less than 20 things to do with blockchain. Marko. - Right, two and a half years ago I had…

I like new things 02:36 - and especially developments that could influence our business, which is news, I had written a white paper for, among others, Erik Roddenhof and a number of people at the top. Back then it seemed like an enormous revolution indeed was taking place. That became an evolution. With WordProof, among others, you now see very logical applications coming up, which are super-scalable and could bring many positive new implications. Right. Perhaps we could switch to Joost. Joost, you have a plug-in that is being used on more than 11 million sites. What does the plug-in actually do? Search Engine Optimization? The plug-in does two things.

03:17 - One the one hand it’s technical, so it solves technical SEO-issues. On the other hand it gives feedback while you’re writing, about how to optimize the text, in order for you to be found in the search engines. In the case of WordProof I think that it’s mainly our technical optimization that is relevant, because we take the information and try to make it as digestible as possible for the search engines. You’re on 11 million sites. Hundreds of articles a day are being published there. What about the connection of your plug-in to WordProof, can they work together in order to prove, at a certain moment, that the information is real and not altered? Funny enough, that issue has actually been solved pretty well by WordProof.

03:59 - What we can do together is to open it up and make it a web standard. Then not only WordProof, but more companies can offer this kind of validation. All of us can achieve this together if we start demanding these kinds of things. That the web is becoming a bit more reliable. That you can see from news on a website where is it from, who wrote it and why. These are things you self-evidently will have to open up. Right. At this moment we actually only read what Google, Facebook or other big social media offer us. How many people will need to collaborate in order to make the internet in the Western world a bit more honest and transparent so the I can see: this is a genuine article. This has not been messed with. - Yes, actually ridiculously few. I think that if you’re being very realistic, that when Google starts doing this, Bing will obviously start supporting it as well. The same goes for Facebook. I think most people arrive at news sources through Facebook, Twitter or Google.

05:01 - So you will only need to focus on these three parties. And look to them to figure out how we can improve this. All the techniques that are necessary to do this, are open source techniques that might be web standards, but that are also for a large part controlled by people of these parties. So if we can convince five people in the world And through those five people, five organizations, then we can do this. Sebastiaan, nice to see you having a timestamp company but you’re small and you’re in Amsterdam.

05:33 - How can this actually grow big? How can this become a standard, and when will companies such as Google begin to say: yes, we will support this. Well, on the one hand through collaboration with parties such as Yoast. The are already implementing a thing called Schema.org. Structured data: how can a search engine see that Vincent is not a word, but your first name. That Dutch Media Week is not a word, or three words, but an event. So on the one hand it is through collaboration with parties like these. To ensure that there will be a web standard in structured data, and on the other hand, it is a collaboration between the consumer, who says: we deserve this transparency and accountability, and the site owners, meaning the online stores, the marketplaces, the publishers, big tech integration, but ultimately also the government. Europe, for example, has done GDPR. They saw: the internet is like the Wild West. With GDPR we at least are giving original data back to the user. This intention is wonderful. The logical sequel to that is that external information for the consumer will be transparent and accountable.

06:35 - Even so, when you have Google and Facebook saying: we find this important, then advertising rates will rise. Immediately. Europe finds it so important that they not only granted a million, the award, but when you go talking to Google, a European Commissioner comes along to join the conversation, right? In Europe you have all kinds of blockchain initiatives. Well, Blockchains for Social Good, which is the award we have won, is esteemed when it comes to the reliability of the internet, because you see that internet is messy, which is reflected in society. So in order to save the world we need a trusted web. - I am Sebastiaan, I’m going to save the world.

07:10 - We are going to solve fake news and similar issues. What does Google say? When you come knocking on their door? The have an interest in the best search results for each user. Transparency and to be able to see where information is coming from, that means a higher quality search result. That is what Joost has often emphasized in presentations. There’s only one good strategy for search engines. And that is to be the best result. - Joost, from Yoast.

07:34 - What is being appreciated at this moment by the search engines and the Bings of this world? - Exactly what Sebastiaan says. So on the one hand it’s writing very high quality content. At the same time, delivering this in such a way that it’s as easy as possible for search engines to process and distribute this. I think what Sebastiaan says is actually very essential. You have to write good information. You have to be the best result. But you will also need to prove that you are just that.

08:06 - Because on the internet a lot of that information is being stolen and reused in other ways and situated. All of us will need to finally start putting an end to this. I understand that you’re a bit skeptical, since it’s Sebastiaan with his small company in Amsterdam. But at the same time I think the method he has chosen is extremely good. We’re both very deeply invested in the WordPress world. WordPress is the CMS with which very large parts of the web are being built. We can already modify things in there and push things forward for what right now is basically the CMS of 38 percent of the web. Do you notice in the discussions… because you are in fact someone who Google actually listens to because you have a huge range… Do you notice that Google is actually interested to remove this fake news? And what about YouTube? - I know less about YouTube. Unfortunately don’t talk to them that often. At Google there are a lot of people who are very excited about this.

09:06 - They really want to keep the open web alive. They also really want information becoming safer and more transparently available. Of course they have a huge interest in that. If the whole web becomes closed, like Facebook, Instagram, etcetera, they will lose their business model. So they have a huge interest in keeping the open web alive. However, at the same time I see at Facebook that the executives are really occupied with this issue. Except the problem is extremely complex. Especially when you look at the American elections, where we once again will all be watching what the influence of the media will be on the results. - It’s a fantastic moment, everybody is occupied with it. - Marko of De Persgroep, right now you are testing things with WordProof. You have a couple of titles in which each article can show where it is from, when it was created and changed.

09:53 - Can you imagine that a company such as Google will attach a higher value in this in terms of quality, that the whole of De Persgroep will switch over and that it will become the standard? I can’t speak for the club who’s testing it right now. I do know that Stefan Havik, one of our digital directors, is seriously betting on the trusted web. In that sense it truly in line with the direction we want to take and where we will have to go as publishers. The ambivalence for me is in the fact that we will yet again will be in the same boat with Google. I believe the power of blockchain is the decentralized web.

10:24 - Where not one big database is in the hands of a tech giant. I think this timestamping is brilliant and that a timestamped article should fetch a higher CPA in the marketplace. Then again, if you would partner with Google again, or with Facebook or all the others, it feels a bit ambiguous. - I understand your problem, Marko. They don’t pay anything for it. Right now they receive simply 50, 60 percent of advertising revenue. Then you have to work with that to solve your issue.

10:50 - - This week I saw a nice video by Sacha Baron Cohen. He said: “Freedom of speech is not freedom of reach.” At the moment “Freedom of reach” is much too persistent and much too dominant. If you could use a blockchain solution where you can truly validate whether something is written by an actual person and not some bot, which is really valuable. Now you need Google to do that, to spread it and make it findable.

11:16 - But at the same time it would be nice to think about an alternative together. - Joost, could you tell met bit about how quick such a change can go. - Eventually this will have to be open standards that everyone can utilize and everyone can build upon. I wish to aid in the development of these open standards. In fact, we are actively doing so. Then I think you can solve Marko’s issue by means of structured data. By stating very transparently: this is what’s on this page. This is about that, these are the people who publish it. This was published at this certain moment, on this date, and there hasn’t been messed with. By providing that data in a very structured manner it’s much easier for anyone to build a new search engine. So when the European Union decides to build a new search engine and finally build a tech company in Europe with a certain amount of power, then it’s possible.

12:19 - Then there’s a structure in the web that facilitates that. Then all that data could be disclosed in a safe and reliable way. I think that is exactly the open source idea, the WordPress philosophy about people having to be free to publish and free to be found. - Let’s talk about the solution. There are a lot of people who will be doing signatures. Who will be doing timestamping. By that time, could I see, for example, the article claiming John de Mol says: Bitcoin is great! I have become so rich! Could I see that that is actually not a real article? - We still need a couple of building blocks for that.

13:00 - So what you’re seeing is: a couple of parties worldwide including Europe itself form an active movement on blockchain identity. It’s called Self-Sovereign Identity. It’s an open source way to establish identity. You can look at it like this: a university hands out a diploma and after that, when the doctor with that diploma in his blockchain wallet writes an article then the visitor can see: was this actually written by a doctor? Is it a reliable source? - Is that genuine? So you can provide bits of identity as evidence on the internet. - Exactly. - And that will become the open standard and that will be on the blockchain. - Back to the John de Mol case. Through video you can see the person in it.

13:43 - Then you could say: a video with John de Mol can be published by anyone on the internet. But when John de Mol himself has put his fingerprint, his timestamp on it, then it is not allowed to be amplified, to be used as advertisement. That’s the way, in fact it’s exactly what Marco says. It’s allowed on the internet, but it cannot be distributed, because when you share misinformation, or fake news, you’re saying: a group of people is messing about, we need to stop sharing that. However, you can’t say they’re not allowed to publish, because that would be censorship.

14:12 - - No, but it would already be very pleasant if Google or Facebook decide not to pick that article and distribute it widely, that would reduce it by a factor of 100 or even 1000. - Exactly, because the danger of fake news is not that it exists, but that it spreads on a large scale. You can counter that with timestamping. Because you link your identity to it. So when the fingerprint is not there it can’t be used for advertising. The great thing with the timestamp you place today is that you can link your identity to it so that in due time everything will correspond retrospectively. - This Self-Sovereign Identity is brilliant.

14:45 - Obviously, the big boys of the internet, Tim Berners-Lee, and the man behind Mozilla, are fully occupied with that. - Blockchain. You were very enthusiastic about it. It would solve all problems, Marko. But how are we doing right now? - What I thenk is very cool is that for our local media, called indebuurt, we are using WordProof right now. To empower local journalists and to determine whether or not something was actually written by a journalist. Recently, Stefan Havik has revealed, in a big press lunch, that we as DPG Media will move towards a trusted web. That was also one of the subjects in my white paper a couple of years ago. That is a very good development.

15:28 - Also, it’s the only way to retain a bit of your autonomy and to defend it relative to Big Tech. Now I still have a question for Sebastiaan. If we’re being honest, Facebook still benefits from fake news. Because it’s the fastest spreading news there is. Do they really have the incentive to stop this? - That’s a good question. What’s interesting to us is the cooperation with Europe. They can enforce it, to put it bluntly. We see timestaping as a logical next step after GDPR. First you had an internet that did not have protection for the consumer. Then you had GDPR to protect you own data. Great intention. And then the next step is about what’s coming towards the consumer.

16:13 - That the consumer has the tools do determine how it has developed and where it’s coming from. So policy is important. Yes, in that sense it’s nice to see. We as Europe are finally moving ahead of things. - We actually have that reputation right now! - Yes, of course, in America they’re saying: we need to do what Europe does. So we need a strict supervisor. We have to organize the internet well. To structure it, which means legislation. - Well, the risk of the way you just verbalized it, is that it could quickly move towards a form of censorship. In the sense of: we must enforce the rules.

16:45 - Look, the great thing about GDPR is not that it censors, but that it’s in fact tooling that empowers the consumer. As Europe, we must not become a kind of internet police. Timestamping is not about policing the internet. It’s an open source way to secure: at this moment in time, this information existed and I can check who put it out there. The sender, but there are also cases in which you don’t want to reveal yourself as the sender.

17:13 - What you could say is that if you don’t link an identity to it, then distribution will be limited. With government identity it could distribute widely. So the question is to what extent do you carry out your identity. It offers consumers tooling to check for themselves: how has it changed over time, transparency, and who does it come from? - Then Google can say: we value this higher and that will suppress fake news. Joost, I would like to ask you, at a certain moment this standard will arrive.

17:44 - Then, in a sense, Google will be enthusiastic and perhaps Facebook will not. But there will be some European legislation. Then it would have to be implemented on a massive scale. If you would include it in your plug-in, how quickly would it be distributed? - We releasing an update every two weeks. I think we’re running on around 40 percent of the WordPress sites out there. So that’s around 16 percent of the web.

18:06 - If something really needs to get out there fast we could have that running within one or two months, with everybody who updates their software. But I think that if standards appear here that are supported on a broad scale that introducing such standards in WordPress itself would not be that hard. And you could roll that out to WordPress, which is 40 percent of the web, within half a year. So it’s not that hard at all. - No. - This is what happened to GDPR as well. That started out as separate plug-ins and now it’s part of the standard package. This can all move fairly quickly. I think the wish is more important. That we would have to look at how we must solve this issue in a way that makes everyone happy.

18:54 - That we all would have to think about that first. That we were in fact way too late when we started thinking about this, but that we as Europe must say: within Europe we have a huge group of customers. Everyone wants a piece of the action. These are the regulations that you have to meet to do this on the internet in Europe. - Then everything will happen very quickly, I can imagine. At a certain moment, the standard will be there.

19:24 - And Joost will implement it at 40 percent of all websites in the world. Because he has his plug-in, but he also works on the core team. At a certain moment, Google will consider it important. Then you will notice that the advertising rates, when it ends up high in Google as a high-quality article, those rates will be higher. How long will it take before De Persgroep will implement it in all of its publications? - Well, I want to pick up on what Joost said.

19:48 - Look, if you want something implemented in the commercial world, then it has to make money. And then everything will go very quickly, of course. - Are there many more besides you? - Not yet, certainly not with the holistic vision. We are truly a holistic ecosystem. We are moving ahead together with Big Tech and the policymakers. In that sense we are the only one in the world.

20:09 - - Is it fun to do this? To fundamentally change the internet? Instead of running a studio for WordPress websites? - Seriously, I’m worried about my parents, if they’re being scammed on the internet, or children. I’d like to have children, so in what kind of world do you put them? When we fix the internet and have a trusted web, society will get better. This actually contributes to that. So I enjoy getting up in the morning. - Joost, why are you doing this? - I have a similar mission as Sebastiaan. I want to improve the web. To make it safer and more reliable. - Well, ladies and gentlemen, you have seen it. I would like to thank Marko, Joost and Sebastiaan very much.

20:51 - This is something practical, in order to make news authentic again. So you can see where it’s from. A very practical thing. It doesn’t cost much, and Joost has proven that it can be implemented very quickly. I think it’s tremendously interesting. You see that with blockchain. Blockchain was super hot, it would solve all problems. But it doesn’t happen that fast, because all kinds of structures are taking time. But now we are really seeing something useful happening in the media.

21:17 - I really like that if people want to implement it. Where do they need to go? - WordProof.com .