Reliability Perception for Islamic Websites

Abstract

Muslims use the internet as a medium to disseminate
Islam. This is seen as necessary due to the wide distribution of Muslims
globally and difficulties to establish Islamic centres to teach Muslims
and perform dawah (delivering message). Along with this, whether
Islamic online information can be trusted has been questioned. The
increase in cases of finding unreliable and sometime Islamophobia
content websites and questionable authenticity of online information
has led researchers and organisations to respond to the reliability
issues. This study explores the reliability perception in relation to
Islamic websites from Muslim users’ perspective. The findings suggest
that availability of Quranic verses, availability of citations for
authentic prophetic biography, referencing authentic Hadith, reflecting
mathahib perspectives, scholars’ and organisations’ involvement, and
recommended websites’ content features are the major factors that
influence the reliability of Islamic websites. Those factors cultivate the
belief that Islamic websites have reliable, authentic, and wellreferenced content. Emphasising these factors would increase the
perceived level of reliability of Islamic websites, which would increase
the acceptance for the Islamic messages delivered.