The real computer virus is the Internet’s unmatched capacity for distributing misinformation. When the mainstream media prints an item that seems, in an old newsroom phrase, “too good to check”, it probably is too good to be true.

…In recent months I have found myself quietly
checking the validity of almost everything I find in
cyberspace and whenever possible doing it the
old-fashioned way: consulting reference books in
libraries, calling professors or original sources on the
phone, double-checking everything…

Seven years ago, AJR warned that an over-reliance
on Lexis-Nexis was leading to a “misinformation
explosion.” Since that time, the number of journalists
using the data retrieval service has increased
exponentially; at many news organizations, libraries
have been phased out and reporters do their own
searches. This has led, predictably, to an entire subgenre
of phony quotes and statistics that won’t die. American Journalism Review