Facebook and Google move to kick fake news sites off their ad networks

Tech companies announce plans to make it harder for money to be made out of posting fake news stories

Both Google and Facebook have announced plans to go after the revenue of fake news sites, kicking the hoaxers off their ad networks in an attempt to prevent misleading the public from being profitable.

Google moved first, announcing on Monday a policy update which restricts its adverts from being placed on fake news sites. "We will restrict ad serving on pages that misrepresent, mis-state, or conceal information about the publisher, the publisher's content, or the primary purpose of the web property," a spokeswoman told Reuters.