Maarten Schenk | Lead Stories

Maarten Schenk is the co-founder and COO/CTO of Lead Stories and an expert on fake news and hoax websites. He likes to go beyond just debunking trending fake news stories and is endlessly fascinated by the dazzling variety of psychological and technical tricks used by the people and networks who intentionally spread made-up things on the internet. He can often be found at conferences and events about fake news, disinformation and fact checking when he is not in his office in Belgium monitoring and tracking viral misinformation.
He won the 2020 "De Zesde Vijs" award from Skepp.be, a foundation in Belgium that promotes critical thinking and fights against pseudoscience. In 2022 he published a book called "De Fake News Files" (in Dutch) about his experiences co-founding and running a fact checking website that grew from two reporters to over seventy people working in a dozen countries.
The Trendolizer™ engine which is used at Lead Stories to detect and monitor trending fake news stories is Maarten's brainchild.
Before co-founding Lead Stories, Maarten worked in speech recognition at Lernout & Hauspie (technology now part of Nuance), project management & blogging at Skynet, weblog software at Six Apart and social media trends at Distractify.
Extra contact info
- Phone: ++32 476 31 07 57
- Skype: schenkm
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/maartenschenk/
About Us
Lead Stories is a fact checking website that is always looking for the latest false, misleading, deceptive or inaccurate stories, videos or images going viral on the internet.
Spotted something? Let us know!.
Lead Stories is a:
WhatsApp Tipline

Have a tip or a question? Chat with our friendly robots on WhatsApp!
Add our number +1 (404) 655-4223, follow this link or scan the image below with your phone:

@leadstories
Most Read
-
-
Fact Check: Trump Did NOT Propose Bill Banning All Green Card Holders From Returning To The U.S., As Of June 11, 2025
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Bubba Wallace Did NOT Call for NASCAR to Ban the White Flag
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Indiana Fever Did NOT Sign 'Gertrud Schlaghammer' -- Joke Post From Satire Page
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: New Balance Did NOT End '$22 Million Contract' With Simone Biles
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Fictional Story That NY Judge Demanded Rep. Ocasio-Cortez's Tax Returns Originated On Self-Described Satire Page
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Disney World Did NOT Announce Replacing American Flags With BLM, Pride, Palestine Flags In Parks -- Rumor First Appeared On Self-Described Satire Site 'Mouse Trap News'
Fact Check
Most Recent
-
Fact Check: Disney Did NOT Ban MAGA Hats From Their Theme Parks in June 2025
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Video Does NOT Prove Submarine Sighting At Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, On June 22, 2025
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Statement About Night Of Champions In Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, Did NOT Originate From WWE
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: That's NOT An Authentic Trump Post On Truth Social Telling Tesla Board To Approve Musk's New Compensation 'ASAP...FFS'
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Pro-Trump Cuban Singer is NOT 'Janet Correa', Whose Husband Later Faced Deportation
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Video Does NOT Show Iranian Missiles 'Getting Ready' To Strike
Fact Check
-
Fact Check: Fictional Story Of $1B Loss From Customer Backlash Against 'Woke' Dunkin' Donuts Ads Is A Recycled Satire Story
Fact Check