"What happens online within a matter of minutes transfers to the streets. People are acting on information that isn't true". That is what Prince Harry said about the problem of disinformation last week.

Harry has more reason than most to fear the spread of disinformation and the misinformationIncorrect or misleading information unintentionally presented as fact. It can be contrasted with disinformation or deliberate lies. it too often leads to. Last year he sued the publisher of the Daily Mirror, alleging that the paper and other news outlets had used illicitNot legally permitted or authorised. phone-hacking to gather information on him and to publish it together with speculation and falsehoods.

How can we fix this problem? Harry suggests the answer is education. People should be taught how to tell the difference between truth and falsehood.

In Finland, students are taught how fake troll accounts operate, and also learn how to spot them. The result is that Finns now have the highest rate of media literacy in Europe.

But others are not so sure that education alone is enough. They say it can be tricky to teach people to be able to distinguish "good" facts from "bad" information.

The most basic way of understanding "truth" is to define it as "what corresponds to the facts". But reality can be interpreted in different ways, making it hard to agree on what is "true".

Another approach is "coherence theory", which states that things are true if they add up to a coherentLogical and well-organised. whole. Truth is not a question of relating to reality, but relating to other facts, like assuming a puzzle piece belongs if it looks like it completes a picture.

Is he right?

Yes! The only way to stand up to disinformation is to build media literacy, which we can only do through education.

No! Disinformation does not make people violent. We cannot deal with online lies without tackling our deep social problems.

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