Facebook and Twitter join effort to tackle surge in fake news
Facebook and Twitter have joined forces with 30 other tech and media companies to help create a platform that will help both social media users and journalists identify fake news and online hoaxes.
The coalition of companies, known as the First Draft Coalition, is back by Google and aims to tackle the surge of fake news stories that have been plaguing social media.
Fake news is everywhere on social media. Celebrity death hoaxes, political hoaxes and a surge in fake entertainment (fauxtire) websites have all been fooling hundreds of thousands online, and it hasn’t helped that Facebook’s automated Trending Topics algorithms have been allowing fake stories to appear, including a fake story about FOX anchor Megyn Kelly and even a 9/11 “truther” conspiracy story.
In the last few years, users have become increasingly reliant on getting their breaking news from the social media platforms they use, but this has only been met with those social media platforms being increasingly less reliable when it comes to filtering out fake news. And this has inevitably been a primary factor in how much misinformation, hearsay and hoaxes are being disseminated across the Internet.
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The First Draft Coalition helps to tackle this. It has several objectives, including developing a platform where users can verify “questionable news”, creating an open communication platform between social media sites and journalists to help quell hoaxes and fake stories, and also to promote and develop news literacy amongst social media users themselves, so we can all try and take some responsibility for the information we choose to share with our friends online.
At least some part of this platform should be available by October 2016, sources claim.
It’s good to see that social media platforms and media outlets are taking the dramatic rise of fake news seriously. Hoaxes and misinformation are no longer being passed between users via the old school chain emails anymore. Now it’s going viral, exploiting social media to reach hundreds of thousands of people instantly. And the problem has only been getting worse.
The saying goes that if you throw enough mud at someone or something, some will inevitably stick. The sheer amount of fake news being distributed across the Internet each day can hinder many of our decision making processes, including for example in the realms of politics and health.
Other members of the First Draft Coalition include the Washington Post, Buzzfeed News, The New York Times and CNN. But the inclusion of Twitter and Facebook, which are often the source or driving catalyst for phony news and online hoaxes, is an important addition to the team.
As for how effective the First Draft Coalition will be when it comes to tackling fake news, and the specifics of how they will help users identify fake news, remains to be seen.
And maybe if it works really well you won’t need us anymore! What do you think? Let us know below.
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