There’s misleading snd there’s misleading. I’ve never worked in a newsroom. However it seem natural to me that changed incentivises (i.e. clicks / engagement) would change how content is written.

I’m fairly distrusting in even my preferred primary news source, not because I suspect that there’s some grand conspiracy, but because the system under which modern journalists (seem to) operate encourages very subtly but very consistently stretching the truth. The KPIs are the puppet master.