77 TELEVISION STATIONS FOUND BROADCASTING FAKE NEWS

CENTER FOR MEDIA & DEMOCRACY - The Center for Media Democracy and Free
Press reports that scores of local stations slipping commercial "video
news releases," or VNRs, into their regular news programming. The new
multimedia report includes footage of 36 separate VNRs and their
broadcast as "news" by TV stations and networks nationwide, including
those in the nation's biggest markets.

"It's shocking to see how product placement moves secretly unfiltered
from the boardroom to the newsroom and then straight into our living
rooms," said Dianne Farsetta, a senior researcher at CMD and co-author
of the report.

Investigators captured 77 television stations actively disguising
sponsored content from companies including General Motors, Intel, Pfizer
and Capital One to make it look like their own reporting. More than
one-third of the time, stations aired fake news stories in their
entirety as their own reporting.

Approximately 80 percent of the stations snared in the investigation are
owned by large conglomerates. The list of the worst offenders includes
Clear Channel, News Corp - Fox Television, Viacom - CBS, Tribune Co. and
Sinclair Broadcast Group - whose Oklahoma City affiliate was caught
airing VNRs on six separate occasions.

"The evidence suggests a strong connection between media consolidation
and the broadcast of deceptive, pre-packaged propaganda," said Timothy
Karr, campaign director of Free Press.

The public interest groups want all VNRs be accompanied by a continuous,
frame-by-frame visual notifications and verbal announcements disclosing
their sources. They also recommended broadcasters be required to file
monthly public reports detailing their use of government or
corporate-sponsored material.

The organizations claime that instances of fake TV news documented by
CMD likely represent less than 1 percent of VNRs distributed to local
newsrooms since last June.

FULL REPORT
www.prwatch.org/fakenews/execsummary

FREE PRESS
www.freepress.net/fakenews