Sourcing policy

Source hierarchy

• Responsible official authority.
• International harmonized institution.
• Peer-reviewed research or respected academic dataset.
• High-quality secondary reporting with original reporting.
• Other secondary sources for orientation only.

Direct links

Current factual claims link to the exact official release, table, decision, law or methodology wherever available. A homepage or source label without a direct URL is insufficient when a more precise link exists.

Primary-source limits

An operator’s own page can establish its schedule, policy or published data. It cannot establish that it is “best,” “safest,” “cheapest” or “most reliable” without independent evidence.

Government and institutional sources are authoritative for their own decisions and statistics, not for every causal or normative interpretation.

Secondary sources

Secondary reporting is used when it contributes:

• an original interview;
• verified local reporting;
• chronology unavailable in official documents;
• independent accountability evidence;
• a credible interpretation or competing viewpoint.

Unnamed sources

See the Anonymous Sources policy. Anonymous attribution is exceptional and cannot support an ordinary statistical claim available from documents.

Source failure

When a source is unavailable, we retain the last verified dated information, mark the outage and seek an official mirror/API/archive. We do not silently substitute an aggregator.

AI-generated citations

An AI-generated source reference is not evidence. It must resolve to a real, relevant document and be checked before use.

Source records

The source manifest stores institution, title, date, URL, tier, geographic scope, claims supported, access date, revision status, licensing notes and archive information.

The full, source-linked bibliography remains in the preserved research corpus.