← All claims

Chain of custody

Crime is 'up 200%' this year

Origin: City data table

On-air read
?

On-air read

A one-word call on whether the circulating version is safe to say on air, judged against the origin:
Accurate — faithful, cleared for air.
Bent — context was lost; add it before using.
Fabricated — not supported by the origin; don't present as fact. It reads the reliability of the final stage.

fabricated

FABRICATED / DISTORTED — do not present as fact

The circulating version is not supported by the origin.

Lineage · origin → circulation
?

Reliability grade

Each stage is graded High, Medium, or Low for how faithfully it carries the origin's meaning. The first stage where the grade drops below the one before it is flagged as where distortion entered.

  1. 0City data tableOrigin
    High reliability

    “One category rose from 2 to 6 incidents in a small precinct.”

  2. 1Local report
    High reliability

    “A specific category tripled in one precinct, off a low base.”

    What changed: kept the base rate

  3. Distortion enters here
    2Aggregator
    Low reliability

    “Crime up 200% in the city.”

    What changed: dropped the precinct + base rate

  4. 3Pundit clip
    Low reliability

    “Crime has tripled everywhere — it's a crisis.”

    What changed: generalized to 'everywhere'

Provenance hash-chain
?

Tamper-evident

Every stage is fingerprinted (SHA-256) and folds in the previous stage's fingerprint. Change any earlier stage and every later fingerprint changes too — so the chain of custody is tamper-evident. The black window is a read-only audit view.

chain-of-custody.log
$ trace --verify cmr1fa14t0005ksxoqrazt2wu
[0] City data table · high · fedaaa5f281c791d5c497c22…
[1] Local report · high · 53635f1437a48345c2dd9822…
[2] Aggregator · low · 405744ff1f4bfa07a26c5310…
[3] Pundit clip · low · 47f5196364ebeaf5b4a61d43…
status: 4 links chained · tamper-evident

Each link folds in the previous link's hash, so editing any earlier stage changes every hash after it.

Ask AI

AI can be wrong. Not medical, legal, or financial advice.

Have a claim of your own? Rebuild its chain of custody stage by stage and get the same on-air read.

Build your own trace →