Yvonne T. Chua discusses the decline of trust in the media in a recent Reuters report. — KAIZZER MANUBA
Filipinos are increasingly getting their news from social media, video platforms and algorithm-driven feeds instead of traditional news outlets, a shift that has contributed to declining trust in news, according to VERA Files co-founder and University of the Philippines professorial lecturer Yvonne T. Chua.
Speaking at the community discussion “Why Don’t Filipinos Trust the News Anymore?” in Mandaluyong City on Monday, Ms. Chua cited findings from the Reuters Institute Digital News Report 2026 showing that only 28% of Filipino respondents trust most news most of the time, down 10 percentage points from a year earlier. She is the author of the Philippine section in the report.
The decline mirrors a broader global trend. The Reuters Institute reported that trust in news across 48 markets fell to 37% this year, the lowest level since it began measuring trust in 2015. Trust declined in 29 of the 48 markets surveyed, with drops of at least five percentage points recorded in 19 countries.
“What we’re seeing now is what we call platform-led news consumption. Or, if you want, the technical term, the platformization of news,” Ms. Chua said.
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