With clicks come profit: a man running a string of fake news sites from Los Angeles told National Public Radio that he made as much as US$30,000 a month from advertising that rewards high traffic.
This idea of fake news outlets making money off of spreading false or misleading information ties to the principle of Nonmalelicence. This ethical principle talks about doing no harm to people with your online interactions. This is exactly what these people are doing, they are taking advantage of social media and how quickly information can spread so that they can make a good profit. They are using people as a means to an end. People who believe this false news are the ones who fall victim to these outlets. Social media applications need to do a better job of vetting fake news before it spreads too far and gets too out of control. Facebook has already started adding warning to people that certain post might be fake news. More applications need to do this to help with this fake news outbreak.