The song, “No Fake News”, performed by rappers DaLab, was first released on March 27 and immediately caught widespread attention. A version with English subtitles debuted the following day.

The new versions are in French, Spanish, Russian, Italian, German, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, Thai, Indonesian, Lao, and Khmer.

The song was produced amid a scourge of fake news, which can cause serious damage to individuals, organisations, businesses, and society as a whole. Fake news on COVID-19, in particular, has flourished in Vietnam and around the world.

Taking advantage of the complex situation surrounding the outbreak, many people have posted false information to attract viewers and “Likes” but have created confusion and anxiety among the public and posed difficulties for prevention and control efforts.

“No Fake News” can be found on VNA’s websites, TV channels, YouTube channel, and Facebook account, the official YouTube channel of DaLab, music websites such as ZingMP3, and TikTok.

It has also been promoted on TV channels such as VTV, VOVTV, VTC, and ANTV, as well as in newspapers.

The song has reached millions of people and attracted more than 320,000 views on DaLab’s YouTube channel and nearly 350,000 views on TikTok.

All 15 versions are available on RapNewsPlus at https://bit.ly/39ZHmAa.

RapNewsPlus is an innovative feature of VNA’s e-newspaper VietnamPlus. The first news was published in November 2013 and the following year RapNewsPlus won the top prize in the “Digital First” category at the World Young Reader Prize, an annual awards programme presented by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA). The prize honours “the news publisher that most creatively engages the young through mobile phones, tablets, and other digital devices”, according to WAN-IFRA.

The edition of RapNewsPlus in 2014 on the East Sea issue was presented in 12 languages (Vietnamese, English, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Arabic, and Bahasa Malaysian) and won the top prize at the First National External Information Service Awards in 2014. VNA

Vietnam’s netizens fight fake news

False health advice, such as eating chicken eggs or marjoram to prevent infection, as well as fabricated information about infected and quarantined people are posted every day to garner hundreds of likes and shares.