facebook held a news conference to explain what it is doing to remove fake news from its pages and therefore from our feeds Best & Fast Fake ID Service. Oliver Darcy from CNN was waiting to ask a pointed question about one of the most prolific sources of conspiracy based fake news, InfoWars.
When asked by Darcy about how the company could claim it was serious about tackling the problem of misinformation online while simultaneously allowing InfoWars to maintain a page with nearly one million followers on its website, John Hegeman said that the company does not “take down false news.””I guess just for being false that doesn’t violate the community standards,” Hegeman said, explaining that InfoWars has “not violated something that would result in them being taken down.”
Hegeman added, “I think part of the fundamental thing here is that we created Facebook to be a place where different people can have a voice. And different publishers have very different points of view.”
“We work hard to find the right balance between encouraging free expression and promoting a safe and authentic community, and we believe that down-ranking inauthentic content strikes that balance. In other words, we allow people to post it as a form of expression, but we’re not going to show it at the top of News Feed.”
“That said: while sharing fake news doesn’t violate our Community Standards set of policies, we do have strategies in place to deal with actors who repeatedly share false news. If content from a Page or domain is repeatedly given a ‘false’ rating from our third-party fact-checkers… we remove their monetisation and advertising privileges to cut off financial incentives, and dramatically reduce the distribution of all of their Page-level or domain-level content on Facebook.”
If Facebook don’t intend to take down fake news then they are encouraging it, they claim that they remove or reduce the ability of page owners to generate income on Facebook if they consider fake news peddlers.
How does this affect Security
The issues occur when those who actually believe the fake news start to share it. Often going viral fake news around security concerns on social media, applications and or websites can cause serious damage to the reputation of those targeted.
It’s one thing to allow and encourage free speech, but when it starts to affect legitimate business those at the centre of the problem need to be brought to book. InfoWars has in the past advertised its site and even some its fake news via YouTube advertising. When those adverts are shown in the middle of an item from a highly reputable company it has the effect of subliminally detracting form the reputation of these firms.
You might have heard about those metered strikes that never happen. Or the fact that some islands in the world can only exist for a decade or so before being submerged by global warming, but they still exist half a century later. While global warming may be a threat, are we getting fake survival warnings to prepare ourselves when there is still time?
All major issues concerning individual nations like the 2016 Presidential election in US and the Brexit vote in the United Kingdom or those issues that are of concern to the whole world like the issue of global warming and climate change are threatened by fake news which can lead to catastrophic results. While the subject of fake news has gained a wider audience following the 2016 US election, fake news has still had a worrisome impact on us.
Fake news is not a recent phenomenon and has existed for a long time but its impact has become more widespread with the spread of the internet and social media. The fake news phenomenon has been aided by the rapid expansion of the digital medium and its capacity to deliver any message across the globe at lightening fast speed. It leads to a situation where such fake news can’t be checked, verified or challenged before it is made available worldwide.
Scientists grapple with fake news. Scientists studying climate change are grappling with this phenomenon of fake news which is able to sow the seeds of confusion in the minds of both the general public whose support is necessary to implement changes to save the environment as well as the decision makers who have the responsibility of making decisions which even if painful are necessary to stop further environmental damage.
In such a scenario it is necessary that scientists step up their efforts for wider dissemination of correct and factual data so that people become more science literate and can appreciate facts as they are and are not swayed by misinformation campaigns and deliberately leaked fake news. World bodies like the United Nations believes that the 2030 sustainable development goals can be met only if scientific literature and discoveries get a wider audience.
The misinformation campaigns and deliberately leaked fake news and controversies have led to a situation where polls both in the US and UK show that even though a large majority of scientists agree to the fact that climate change phenomenon of the modern era is largely fueled by human activities, the general populace is not aware of such unanimity on the issue while many believe that it is still an unsettled issue. Such a large scale denial of climate change and its causes is a direct result of the failure of the scientific community to effectively challenge fake news about the issue.
A change of habits is needed. In their quest of wider dissemination of correct and factual data, scientists must change their long ingrained habit of sharing information among the scientific community as their prime objective and instead must develop the habit of sharing their information not only with the scientific community but with the general public also.
In their pursuit of disseminating scientific information scientists must use the help of latest technological tools so that they are able to develop effective means of two-way communication with the general public. The new interdisciplinary field of translational ecology can help scientists work towards changing environmental research into public policy.
Turning the current scenario into one where society understands and appreciates their point of view and is able to ascertain and understand the facts about climate change is essential if environmental issues are to receive widespread support across the world. One of the ways by which we can support the growth of scientific temper is to know what fake news is and trying to stop it from spreading.
What is fake news? Ever since ancient times, rulers have indulged in slanting and planting news to serve their interests. But giving a slant to a news to suit one’s beliefs or ideology cannot be called fake news. Fake news can be described as a completely fabricated story without any basis that has been floated by vested interests to serve their own purpose.
We are also to blame! Today with the advent of the internet everyone from an individual to media to government have a share in the spread of fake news even though their motives to do so may vary from increasing political clout, to achieving financial goals or any personal agenda. But how to know whether the news is genuine or fake?
In sifting for fake news, look at the origins of the news. If it is carried by a legitimate source of news chances are that it will not be fake but if it has originated from sources you have not heard of or are known to be of dubious nature then you must take such news with a pinch of salt and verify it from a known authentic source before you start believing it. The most obvious solution for checking the spread of fake news is human intervention. Technology by itself cannot sift and segregate fake news. Realizing this dimension Facebook has started such a practice and has enlisted International Fact Checking Network to look into that news that users have flagged as deliberate fakes.
Stopping the spread of fake news, you yourself must start to take responsibility of what you share. Do not share anything on the social media without going into the detail of the story or the photograph. Check the source of the story or the photo you wish to circulate and only if they come from some reputable sources should you share them.