Criteria for including a website in the database

We create a list of websites, with respect to which the members of our Review Board have doubts regarding their credibility and content quality.

The choice is yours whether you agree with our list and whether you use it. The list of websites was compiled by the Review Board members based on their professional assessment of these websites under clearly defined criteria. The Review Board members do this work on a voluntary basis since they are convinced that it is of value to the whole society.

In our database you will find websites that meet, in the opinion of the Review Board, at least one of the following points:

1. 1.

   A website contains materials of fraudulent or charlatan nature, such as miraculous healing, magic preparations and the like. The reviewed criterion is the conflict with objective, scientific knowledge, especially if such published information could lead to neglecting any necessary treatment or directly damage one’s health. This does not apply to traditional alternative treatment methods, promotion of healthy lifestyle or healing procedures based on nature etc.

2. 2.

   A website contains misleading news, misinformation or false propaganda, i.e. any claims that are in conflict with the facts, e.g. photos or videos used in some misleading context, made up or severely misinterpreted events, etc. This does not apply to clearly presented opinion articles.

3. 3.

   A website contains conspiracy theories and “delusions” that could have more serious political, economic or health consequences, stirring up passionate or hateful feelings without any critical assessment. This does not apply to curiosities, mysteries, or clearly marked speculations.

4. 4.

   A website contains vulgarisms, calls to violence, extremist content, spreading false alarms, aggressive personal attacks, such as “eye-for-eye”, defamation of minorities, races, nationalities, religious groups, etc.

5. 5.

   A website does not respect fundamental principles of journalistic ethics: it does not publish disclaimers (dementi), it leaves published and uncorrected any news that has been objectively proven untrue. A website does not have a clear owner or authors (protected sources of information and pseudonyms are respected), the site does not publish any responses by concerned parties, it grossly mixes the actual news with commentaries, repeatedly publishes shocking and false claims aimed at increasing visitor traffic, which it however quickly corrects, etc.

We shall gradually supplement and adapt these criteria based on our practical experience. Our primary goal is to protect the advertisers and their interests. The activities of the Review Board and the rules both follow this goal and we reserve the right to amend them as necessary.

Our database is purely of advisory nature and it is the responsibility of each advertiser to consider how to use it. It represents the opinion of the Review Board, which opinion we by no means present as a fact.