Facebook ducking duty to tackle fake news, says Snow
Veteran presenter claims the social media giant’s principles are changed at Mark Zuckerberg’s whim
FACEBOOK’S unwillingness to tackle “fake news” could present a threat to democracy, according to Jon Snow, who claimed the company’s principles were changed according to the whims of Mark Zuckerberg. The Channel 4 newsreader said Facebook was ducking its “moral duty” to root out the “cancerous” spread of fake stories.
Delivering the annual Mactaggart Lecture at the Edinburgh International Television Festival, Snow said Facebook and Google were all-powerful.
“Never, since the rise of the printing press, have two companies held such a monopoly over the world’s information,” he told the audience.
The company enables news organisations to reach young people in a way that television and radio cannot, Snow said. But he aimed his harshest criticism at Zuckerberg, Facebook’s chief executive, and pointed to a bogus news story which claimed that the Pope had endorsed Donald Trump for the US presidency that engaged one million people.
Snow said: “That same algorithm that prioritised many amazing reports of ours, also prioritised fakery on a massive scale.
“Facebook has a moral duty to prioritise veracity over virality. It is fundamental to our democracy. Facebook’s lack of activity in this regard could prove a vast threat to democracy.
“Facebook’s principles are seldom explained in detail and can change overnight at Mr Zuckerberg’s whim.” He said of Zuckerberg: “He says he cares about news, but does he really? Or does he care about keeping people on Facebook?”
Snow said Google and Facebook “need to pay more taxes. It cannot be beyond the bounds of understanding to come up with a way of ensuring that these mega entities have to pay to play.”
He also believes they should be forced to pay for the journalism they carry and accused Facebook of playing “fast and loose” with material made by others “at great expense”. “Facebook feasts on our products and pays all but nothing. This cannot last. Governments, the EU and others have to play an even bigger part in forcing them to pay,” he said.
Snow claimed that deep cuts to local journalism as a result of classified advertising shifting to Google and Facebook were to blame for a “disconnect” in society.
Snow, who has been accused of Leftwing bias, said he was one of the privileged few. “I didn’t need to gravitate to the elite – I was born into it,” he said.