Method·Jun 10, 2026·4 min read
What “verified” should mean in a data product
A field is verified only when you hold both a source and a date. Everything else gets labelled honestly. Here’s the standard we hold ourselves to.
“Verified” is the most abused word in data marketing. Often it means “we saw this somewhere once.” We use a stricter test: a signal is verified only when we hold both a source and a verification date.
The states we actually expose
Verified — positive fact, source + date held. Clear — a negative screen we ran (e.g. no FDA warning on file). Flagged — an adverse finding. Reported — self-reported, not yet independently checked. Unverified / not screened — we haven’t checked yet.
Crucially, the last two are shown as-is in the API. We would rather return an empty field than dress one up.