Article Structured Data;:Parse error on line 1

Question

I have copied this code from Google Search Central, entered it on JSONLINT but it is producing:

Error: Parse error on line 1:
< script type = "app
^
Expecting 'STRING', 'NUMBER', 'NULL', 'TRUE', 'FALSE', '{', '[', got 'undefined'

I have copied the code as is, without making any edits, what is wrong with the code?

< script type = "application/ld+json" > {
        "@context": "https://schema.org",
        "@type": "NewsArticle",
        "headline": "Title of a News Article",
        "image": [
            "https://example.com/photos/1x1/photo.jpg",
            "https://example.com/photos/4x3/photo.jpg",
            "https://example.com/photos/16x9/photo.jpg"
        ],
        "datePublished": "2015-02-05T08:00:00+08:00",
        "dateModified": "2015-02-05T09:20:00+08:00",
        "author": [{
            "@type": "Person",
            "name": "Jane Doe",
            "url": "https://example.com/profile/janedoe123"
        }, {
            "@type": "Person",
            "name": "John Doe",
            "url": "https://example.com/profile/johndoe123"
        }]
    } <
    /script>

I first entered the code into Webflow blog page template, then made the edits within Weblow. Before saving anything I tested it on JSON LINT which came back with Parse Error.

I then took the original code from Google and ran it on JSON LINT with the same result. This tells me there is something wrong with the original code, no?