Why Tech Is Losing Trust

Global trust in Big Tech is falling drastically, and its unapologetic censorship of the “wrong” news surely has a lot to do with it. Such as Facebook’s nixing a post from Fox News contributor Lara Trump simply because it features an interview with former President Donald Trump.

That’s right: Looks like the social-media giant wants to make the ex-prez a non-person.

Lara Trump spoke to her father-in-law for her podcast Tuesday night, then posted the 18-minute clip on her Facebook page. The tech giant killed the post, then e-mailed, “Further content posted in the voice of Donald Trump will be removed and result in additional limitations on the accounts.”

Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and Snapchat all banned the 45th president after he was accused of inciting the Jan. 6 Capitol riots. Before Lara’s interview had even aired, a Facebook employee e-mailed the Trump team that “new posts with President Trump speaking” are now forbidden for all “former surrogates” of the president.

Trump’s Jan. 6 speech was reprehensible, but the bans by social media are hypocritical and unevenly enforced. AOC gets to rant about supposed “white supremacy,” and Silicon Valley just nods. Ayatollah Khamenei is still allowed to post anti-Semitic rants, and any number of left-wing agitators to harass and use hate speech. Keeping Trump offline — forever — is looking more and more like a vendetta rather than policy.

It all helps explain why the Edelman Trust Barometer’s survey of 31,000 people in 27 different countries shows that trust in tech hit all-time low in 17 nations last year.

Americans’ trust fell nine points (on a 0-100 scale), dropping tech from the “most trusted” industry a year ago to ninth by the October/ November survey, with social media the least trusted of all business categories. Expect their reputation to continue to fall.