Online sites must respect system with facts

I find it shocking that an online site lifted information from a Facebook comment and passed it off as fact when it did not hear back from officials (" Shanmugam slams 'deliberate falsehoods' to tar police"; yesterday).

The false information became repeated so much that even someone as respected as the president of the Law Society, Mr Thio Shen Yi, appeared to have assumed the false information as fact and put out comments on the criminal justice system.

Online sites should not perpetuate false information. They should show more respect for the system and let the facts come out at the coroner's inquiry.

The case discussed in Parliament on Tuesday is a sad tragedy that involved the loss of a young life, thus, there will be media interest.

However, it is more important that the reporting of such cases be done fairly, instead of trying to increase readership with false information.

Joseph Tan Soon Meng

This article was first published on March 3, 2016.
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