Facebook using fact-checkers and disputed labels to clamp down on fake news

Posted by: admin , March 7, 2017

In its quest to clamp down on fake news, Facebook has started using third party fact-checkers, and will soon provide users with the option of a ‘disputed’ label for posts.
While dodgy news is still likely to show up in your feed, it will be accompanied by a warning banner.
To be flagged in this manner, a post needs to be caught by Facebook’s automated software or flagged by a certain number of users.
These posts are then sent to fact-checkers such as Snopes and PolitiFact. The banner is then applied of 2 more ‘flags’ are received.
For the record, ‘fake news’ should refer to news that is objectively fake and unsupported, rather than news not liked by a particular segment.