My journey with 'Internet Access In-Depth' (fact-checking), and a concept for improvement
planned
E
Endre
The story begins with a fact-checking task. I've read a claim somewhere (Russians bombed a certain Ukrainian facility) and wanted to research it in Russian language environment, relying on Merlin to overcome the language barriers. The communication took place in Hungarian: https://www.getmerlin.in/hu/share/chat/iaWbVD8lfTq
- Although I asked it to search in Russian, its first response included Hungarian results.
- I explained that this wasn't helpful and asked it to search in Russian. It then provided Russian results and confirmed there was news about this.
However, none of the three linked articles actually contained the claim, they only discussed the relevant technology in general terms.
PROPOSED SOLUTION: I suggest programming an agent-like behavior.
- Extract search terms, conduct search.
- Extract the statement being fact-checked into a variable: e.g., factCheckingStatement. (Easy to detect various forms of 'fact-checking' in the prompt.)
- Extract relevant results and article contents.
- Examine each result's text individually (like an internal cycle of 'Chat with This Webpage') with the following prompt: "Perform fact-checking: Does the article state that {factCheckingStatement}?"
This is exactly how I confirmed that the Russian-language articles found do not actually mention the event I was looking for.
Vijay Bharadwaj
planned
Vijay Bharadwaj
Interesting observation, Endre.
I'd suggest you not to use "In-Depth" search on Merlin Extension -- it's old and deprecated. The new UI's Live Search is the most accurate and high-quality search offering from Merlin.
Using Live Search, I tried the same thing myself. When asked in English (or taking from English sources)
"A Russian military strike in April 2025 completely destroyed an underground factory in Kiev that was producing engines for Neptune missiles and rocket systems...."
I believe this IS the event you wanted Merlin to refer to.
When searching in Russian, (response translated)
"Russian military has struck military infrastructure facilities in Ukraine, including defense industry plants, but there is no specific information about the complete destruction of the Neptune missile plant."
"According to the Russian Defense Ministry, the strikes targeted military airfield infrastructure facilities, aircraft repair plants, various defense industry enterprises, as well as drone production facilities and storage sites. A confirmed fact is the destruction of a Neptune missile launcher, but this refers specifically to a mobile position or installation, and not to the plant that produces these missiles."
Upon enquiring about a timeline for this event (in Russian):
"On April 25, 2025, it was reported that the Russian military struck an underground workshop in Kyiv, where engines for Neptune missiles, MLRS and drones were produced. This workshop was completely destroyed, according to pro-Russian sources."
It's clear there's a difference in how sources across languages convey the same thing, which is leading to a difference.
Regardless, we're working on better search and research pipelines that fact-check and keep track of information validity better across languages as well. Good idea, thanks!