Reliability in Time: Evaluating the Web Sources of Information on COVID-19 in Wikipedia across Various Language Editions from the Beginning of the Pandemic

Abstract: There are over a billion websites on the Internet that can potentially serve as sources of information on various topics. One of the most popular examples of such an online source is Wikipedia. This public knowledge base is co-edited by millions of users from all over the world. Information in each language version of Wikipedia can be created and edited independently. Therefore, we can observe certain inconsistencies in the statements and facts described therein - depending on language and topic. In accordance with the Wikipedia content authoring guidelines, information in Wikipedia articles should be based on reliable, published sources. So, based on data from such a collaboratively edited encyclopedia, we should also be able to find important sources on specific topics. This effect can be potentially useful for people and organizations. The reliability of a source in Wikipedia articles depends on the context. So the same source (website) may have various degrees of reliability in Wikipedia depending on topic and language version. Moreover, reliability of the same source can change over the time. The purpose of this study is to identify reliable sources on a specific topic - the COVID-19 pandemic. Such an analysis was carried out on real data from Wikipedia within selected language versions and within a selected time period.