Election day is here. We may see a flood of false information about President Donald Trump and his challenger, former Vice President Joe Biden. Researchers are warning about images or videos of ballot tampering that may be old or out of context, misleading statistics on voter fraud, and baseless allegations of foreign interference.

Before sharing an online rumor to your friends and family, take the time to verify it. This can be as easy as checking how recently an account sending out the information has been created, comparing the claim to what reputable news outlets are saying, searching online to find another source, or doing a reverse image search.

Today we’ll be keeping a running list of unverified, misleading, and fake claims that we have been able to debunk. This list will be updated throughout the day, so please check back.

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How to read this post:

UNVERIFIED: Claims that have no concrete evidence either confirming or refuting them. This type of claim has either no sources or no evidence, and is based on conjecture with no original reporting behind it. Treat this kind of information with healthy skepticism and wait to see how it develops.

MISLEADING: Posts that take a real event out of context, for example: miscaptioning a video or photo from the protests. This can also include images that are presented at a deceptive angle or descriptions that cherry-pick facts. Avoid spreading or engaging with this type of post.

FALSE: Reporters or reliable sources with direct knowledge have contradicted this information on the record, or it is refuted by unimpeachable evidence. Examples include images or videos filmed at a different time or location but presented as recent, demonstrably false claims, and websites masquerading as news outlets publishing untrue information.

A screenshot of what appeared to be a pre-filled-out ballot circulated widely over the weekend and was retweeted by Eric Trump, the president’s son, to 4.3 million followers on Twitter. Although it looked nefarious, in an interview with FactCheck.org, an official with the New York Board of Election solved the mystery.

It turned out that the voter received a blank ballot, filled it out, and accidentally mailed it to themselves, receiving it back at their address. Officials were able to figure out what happened because the voter’s ID was clearly visible in the photo.

“This is the height of irresponsibility to continue to make these false claims” the New York Board of Elections tweeted.

Local press covered the falsehood, which spread widely across social media, where the decontextualized image received thousands of likes, shares, and comments. Twitter and Facebook have both labelled the claim as misleading.

Richard Grenell, a Trump supporter and the former acting Director of National Intelligence, falsely claimed a photo of a maskless Joe Biden showed the former vice president not following his own advice to wear a mask curing the pandemic. In fact, the photo was taken before the pandemic, in Nov. 2019, as made clear by the caption in Vogue magazine where it originally ran.

As CNN reporter Andrew Kaczynski noted, the misleading tweet was also spread by conservative commentator Mark Levin, garnering more than 50,000 additional likes and retweets.

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