Perennial sources list

Daily Mail

In February 2017, after a formal community discussion, editors on the English Wikipedia banned the use of the Daily Mail as a source in most cases.[25][21][12] Its use as a reference is now "generally prohibited, especially when other more reliable sources exist",[25][26] and it can no longer be used as proof of notability.[25] The Daily Mail can still be used as a source in an about-self fashion, when the Daily Mail itself is the subject of discussion.[27][5] Support for the ban centered on "the Daily Mail's reputation for poor fact checking, sensationalism, and flat-out fabrication".[28][25][21] Some users opposed the decision, arguing that it is "actually reliable for some subjects" and "may have been more reliable historically."[29] The Daily Mail thus became the first deprecated source.[12]

Wikipedia's ban of the Daily Mail generated a significant amount of media attention, especially from the British media.[5] Though the Daily Mail strongly contested this decision by the community, Wikipedia's co-founder Jimmy Wales backed the community's choice, saying: "I think what [the Daily Mail has] done brilliantly in this ad funded world, they've mastered the art of clickbait, they've mastered the art of hyped-up headlines. They've also mastered the art of—I'm sad to say—of running stories that simply aren't true. And that's why Wikipedia decided not to accept them as a source anymore. It's very problematic, they get very upset when we say this, but it's just fact."[30] A February 2017 editorial in The Times on the decision said: "Newspapers make errors and have the responsibility to correct them. Wikipedia editors' fastidiousness, however, appears to reflect less a concern for accuracy than dislike of the Daily Mail's opinions."[31] Slate writer Will Oremus said the decision "should encourage more careful sourcing across Wikipedia while doubling as a richly deserved rebuke to a publication that represents some of the worst forces in online news."[29]

In 2018, the Wikipedia community reaffirmed the Daily Mail's deprecation as a source.[5] In November 2020, Daily Mail sister paper The Mail on Sunday was also deprecated.[14]

Fox News

As of 2022, thousands of articles on Wikipedia use Fox News as a source. In 2010, the Wikipedia community held its first major discussion of Fox News's reliability. The community decided that Fox News was politically biased, but generally reliable. Since 2010, Fox News has been the subject of numerous debates on Wikipedia about its reliability. Discussions have run over hundreds of thousands of words and have included the input of over 100 editors. Many conversations have sought to establish, or enforce, a distinction between bias and reliability, with the latter having more to do with fact-checking and accuracy, though some argued that a consistent amount of errors and retractions in reporting are normal for a reliable media outlet.[32]

In July 2020, the Wikipedia community announced that Fox News would no longer be considered "generally reliable" in its reporting of science and politics, and that it "should be used with caution to verify contentious claims" about those topics.[33] The decision was made because Fox News downplayed the COVID-19 pandemic, because of allegations that it spread misinformation about climate change, and because it reported on the false concept of "no-go zones" for non-Muslims in British cities. The decision did not affect Fox News's reliability on other topics.[34]

In 2022, the Wikipedia community announced that Fox News would be considered "marginally reliable" in its reporting on science and politics. This meant that it cannot be used as a source for "exceptional claims" and that its reliability would be decided on a case-by-case basis for other scientific and political claims. The decision applies only to articles on Fox News's website and articles about topics that are scientific or political.[32] As of June 2024, Fox News and its talk shows are considered generally unreliable sources for scientific and political coverage.[10][20] These assessments do not apply to local affiliates owned by Fox.[32]

Red Ventures

In February 2023, Wikipedia editors downgraded the reliability rating of CNET, a technology website owned at the time by Red Ventures, to "generally unreliable" after it was revealed that CNET was publishing content generated by artificial intelligence. CNET's reliability rating is broken into three time periods: pre-October 2020 (generally reliable prior to the acquisition), October 2020–October 2022 (no consensus on reliability following the acquisition by Red Ventures, "leading to a deterioration in editorial standards") and November 2022–present (generally unreliable, after CNET began using AI "to rapidly generate articles riddled with factual inaccuracies and affiliate links").[35][36] The CNET incident resulted in editors expressing concern about the reliability of Red Ventures–owned websites, such as Bankrate and CreditCards.com, which also published AI-generated content around the same time.[36] In 2024, after a discussion on the reliability of Red Ventures–owned tech website ZDNET, a discussion was initiated of the reliability of all Red Ventures websites.[35] Red Ventures websites The Points Guy (TPG) and Healthline are on the spam blacklist, due to TPG's questionable relationships with the credit card companies it covers and Healthline's publication of misinformation.[35]

Anti-Defamation League

In April 2024, a discussion was initiated about the reliability of the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) on its reliability on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, on antisemitism, and on the ADL's hate symbols database.[4] The discussion engaged 120 editors over two months[20] and included a wide range of perspectives, summarized by editors as "ranging from those who enthusiastically defended the ADL in all contexts, to those who viewed it as "categorically unreliable".[4]

In June 2024, the discussion led to the ADL being downgraded to a "generally unreliable" source on the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, including "the intersection of antisemitism and the [Israeli–Palestinian] conflict, such as labeling pro-Palestinian activists as antisemitic".[4][20] An English Wikipedia administrator who evaluated the community's consensus for this discussion said there was substantial evidence that the ADL acted as a "pro-Israeli advocacy group" that has published unretracted misinformation "to the point that it taints their reputation for accuracy and fact checking regarding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict", as well as that it has a habit "of conflating criticism of the Israeli government's actions with antisemitism".[4] The editors cited the ADL updating its methodology to classify pro-Palestinian protests as antisemitic incidents, controversial statements made by ADL CEO Jonathan Greenblatt that were criticized by the ADL's own staff, and its reliance on the IHRA definition of antisemitism, which critics have said is too broad and can be used to suppress pro-Palestinian speech.[10]

The editors reached a consensus that "the ADL can roughly be taken as reliable on the topic of antisemitism when Israel and Zionism are not concerned". Of the ADL's hate symbol database, editors determined that "the rough consensus here is that the database is reliable for the existence of a symbol and for straightforward facts about it, but not reliable for more complex details, such as symbols' history".[4] The RSP listing for the ADL was updated to read that "outside of the topic of the Israel/Palestine conflict, the ADL is a generally reliable source, including for topics related to hate groups and extremism in the U.S."[4][37]

The ADL condemned the downgrade, alleging it was part of a "campaign to delegitimize" the organization.[10] The decision was also criticized by over 40 Zionist organizations, including Jewish Federations of North America, B'nai B'rith International and HIAS.[38] The Wikimedia Foundation said in response, "The Foundation has not, and does not, intervene in decisions made by the community about the classification of a source".[20]

James Loeffler, a professor of modern Jewish history at Johns Hopkins University, said the English Wikipedia's decision was a "significant hit" to the ADL's credibility. Dov Waxman, professor of Israel Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles, said that if "Wikipedia and other sources and the journalists start ignoring the ADL's data, it becomes a real issue for Jewish Americans who are understandably concerned about the rise of antisemitism". Mira Sucharov, a professor of political science at Carleton University, said the decision was "a sign that the Jewish community needs better institutions".[10]