Facebook, the largest social networking site on the Internet, has announced tangible steps to fight the plague of hoaxes and fake news that circulate prolifically across their platform.
The move comes after the proliferation of fake news surged during the run up to the 2016 presidential election, with some claiming that it may have even had an effect on the outcome.
While Facebook has previously claimed it was tackling the issue with updates to its algorithms, this latest announcement shows clear, tangible steps on behalf of Facebook.
– Facebook have added a “It’s a fake news story” to their reporting option that allows Facebook users to report a story as fake. For us, it could be reached by clicking the Report option and selecting “I think it shouldn’t be on Facebook” (see image below.)
– If enough people select this new reporting option, the story is sent to third party fact-checkers that are signatories of the Poynter’s Fact Checking Code of Principles. If these fact checking organisations agree that the story is a hoax, any links to the story will be flagged as “Disputed”.
– A disputed story will carry a label that reads “Disputed by 3rd Party Fact Checkers” and include a link to see why the link was disputed. Additionally, when a user attempts to share the story on their timeline, another warning will appear, telling the user that the story is disputed. Stories that carry the disputed label cannot be made into ads or promoted (boosted.) See image below.
– Facebook has also stated that they will be making more algorithm changes to see how many users are willing to share a story after reading, to look for signs that the story may have been misleading, which it will incorporate in its ranking.
– Facebook will begin penalising websites that mislead visitors by designing themselves to look like a particular media outlet, by ranking them lower in the newsfeed.
Facebook has stated in a recent post that these are just some early steps that they are taking, and in time they will look into iterating and extending them.
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The move has already drawn much feedback, and we’ve attempted to answer some of the popular questions here.
In a Facebook post, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg asserted that the move to tackle fake news would be focused on “obvious hoaxes” and that Facebook would “fight to give all people a voice and resist the path of becoming arbiters of truth ourselves.”
In response to a question raised on Facebook, Zuckerberg wrote –
I understand how sensitive this is and I have instructed our team to proceed carefully and focus on fighting spam, not flagging opinions. For example, we’re focused on obvious hoaxes with headlines like “Michael Phelps just died of a heart attack” designed to get people to click on the stories and see ads. Our goal is to reduce these hoaxes just like we fight other scams on our platform, but I want us to be especially careful about never being arbiters of truth ourselves
This was reiterated on the Facebook announcement –
We believe in giving people a voice and that we cannot become arbiters of truth ourselves, so we’re approaching this problem carefully. We’ve focused our efforts on the worst of the worst, on the clear hoaxes spread by spammers for their own gain…
While not explicitly stated by Facebook, this is likely down to the possibility that any story expressing strong opinions – be it political, religious or economical in nature – would receive enough reports from those that disagree with those opinions to become flagged.
The fact-checkers that Facebook are using are signatories of the Poynter’s Fact Checking Code of Principles. Those principles – which each signatory agrees to – promote an unbiased, bipartisan approach to fact checking, that incorporates a methodology that includes providing links to sources so others can replicate the work of the fact checker.
If anyone believes a fact-checker signatory is not complying with the code of principles, they can reach out to Poynter.
Anyone can apply to become a signatory of Poynter, though at the time of writing they are developing a new application process in light of Facebook’s move to tackle fake news and are not currently accepting new signatories.
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This is a first step that Facebook is taking, and at this stage Facebook have asserted that they are focusing on “clear hoaxes” that can be demonstrably proven to be false. However the move by Facebook has still drawn critics and scepticism who believe that the move by Facebook threatens certain viewpoints, especially ones related to political discourse.
There are going to be areas inherently more difficult to tackle than others. It may be easy enough to debunk a claim that Michael Phelps died of a heart attack, but we will have to wait and see how this new feature will tackle more controversial and complex issues like conspiracy theories and climate change discourse, for example.
What do you think of Facebook’s latest steps to tackle fake news? Let us know below.
