TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Commenting on the number of fake online news websites, Nukman Luthfie, Expert Online Strategist and the Founder of Virtual Consulting, advised that the editor in chiefs whose websites have been cloned to immediately take action. "They should file a complaint to news.com to have those websites removed," Nukman said yesterday.

The cloned websites were kompas.com, antaranews.com, detik.com, tempo.co, tribunnews.com, and inilah.com. The Uniform Resource Locator (URL/web address) of the fake websites have an additional "—news.com" at the end. For example, tempo.co would be shown as tempo.co—news.com, and liputan6.com would be liputan6.com—news.com.

The news published on these websites are nothing but wrong publications. They contain false accusations on one of the presidential candidates in the last election.

Other than filing a complaint, the editor in chiefs should also notify their readers about the fake websites. It can be through an open announcement or through an article. "The steps such as the notifications by the editor in chief of tempo.co should be set as an example," said Nukman.

To differentiate between the actual and fake websites, readers should not only read the headlines but also open the link and check whether the URL is correct. "If it is real, then it is okay to spread the word," he said.

URSULA FLORENE SONIA