Facebook will start telling you when a story may be fake
FACEBOOK has struggled for months over whether it should crack down on false stories and hoaxes being spread on its site. Now, it has finally come to a decision.
The social network is going to partner with the Poynter International Fact- Checking Network, which includes groups such as Snopes, to evaluate articles flagged by Facebook users.
If those articles don’t pass the smell test for the fact- checkers, Facebook will pass on that evaluation with a little label whenever they are posted or shared, along with a link to the organisation that debunked the story.
“We have a responsibility to reduce the spread of fake news on our platform,” said Facebook’s Adam Mosseri, vice president of product development, in an interview with The Washington Post. Mosseri added that Facebook still wants to be a place where people with all kinds of opinions can express themselves. And Facebook has no interest in being the arbiter of what’s true and what isn’t for its billion users, he said.
The new system will work like this: If there’s a story out there that is patently false – saying that a celebrity is dead when they aren’t, for example – then users will see a notice saying that the story has been disputed or debunked.
People who try and share stories that have been found false will also see an alert before they post. Flagged stories will also appear lower in the News Feed than unflagged stories.
Users will also be able to report potentially false stories to Facebook, or send messages to the person posting a questionable article directly.
The company is focusing, for now, on what Mosseri called the “bottom of the barrel” websites which are purposefully set up to deceive and spread fake news, as well as those that are impersonating other news organisations.
“We are not looking to flag legitimate organisations,” Mosseri said.
“We’re looking for pages posing as legitimate organisations.” — WP-Bloomberg