· Pantelis Theodosiou

TrulyMedia Platform - Collaborative Digital Verification Tool

A collaborative platform designed to help journalists, fact-checkers, and human rights defenders assess the credibility of digital content, particularly on social media. Co-developed by Deutsche Welle and Athens Technology Center.

A collaborative platform designed to help journalists, fact-checkers, and human rights defenders assess the credibility of digital content, particularly on social media. Co-developed by Deutsche Welle and Athens Technology Center.

The Challenge

In the age of viral misinformation, verifying the authenticity of user-generated content (UGC) is critical for journalism and human rights defense.

  • Context: Breaking news often relies on social media footage, but fake or manipulated content is rampant.
  • Problem: Journalists lacked a centralized, collaborative environment to aggregate, verify, and track social media assets in real-time.
  • Goal: Build a unified platform where dispersed teams can collectively analyze and verify digital content.

The Solution

Reference by major broadcasters and NGOs, TrulyMedia is the industry standard for collaborative verification.

  • Strategy: Creating a real-time collaborative workspace that integrates powerful verification tools directly into the investigative workflow.
  • Key Capabilities:
    • Digital Forensics: Built-in tools for reverse image search, EXIF data analysis, and geolocation.
    • Real-time Collaboration: Shared workspaces allowing teams to comment, label, and verify items simultaneously.
    • Multi-Source Aggregation: Streamlined collection of data from Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, and other social networks.

Digital Verification Board

Technical Architecture

Designed for high-reliability and complex data handling.

  • Tech Stack: Vue.js, Node.js, MongoDB, Socket.IO.
  • Architecture: A modular SPA with a real-time event-driven backend to support live collaboration.
  • Key Decisions:
    • Socket.IO: Implemented for instant updates (e.g., "User X is viewing this item") to prevent work duplication.
    • Microservices: Decomposed verification tools into separate services for scalability and easier maintenance.

My Role & Contributions

I focused on platform stability, feature enhancement, and frontend architecture.

  • Core Engineering: Developed critical features for the single-page application, ensuring smooth performance with large datasets.
  • Integration: Seamlessly integrated external authentication providers and third-party verification APIs.
  • Accessibility: Led the initiative to ensure the platform met WCAG standards, making it usable for a wider range of investigators.

Digital Analysis

Challenges & Learnings

  • Obstacle: Handling massive streams of social media data in real-time without degrading UI performance.
  • Solution: Implemented virtual scrolling and optimized state management to handle thousands of items efficiently.
  • Takeaway: Performance optimization in data-heavy SPAs requires careful planning of the rendering pipeline.

Impact & Results

  • Outcome: Trusted by organizations like Amnesty International and Deutsche Welle for critical investigations.
  • Metric: reduced verification time significantly by centralizing toolsets.
  • Feedback: "An indispensable tool for modern digital journalism."
Share:
Back to Projects