Facebook will alert people who interact with COVID-19 misinformation

Facebook’s vice president of integrity, Guy Rosen, published a blog post on the platform’s news page yesterday, April 16, 2020, regarding a new update that keeps people informed and limits misinformation about the Coronavirus Disease or COVID-19. Through this new update, Facebook will be leading people to the right information coming from credible sources if they get exposed to misinformation. 

How does the Facebook COVID-19 update work?

People will be receiving a message from Facebook once they react or comment on contents that are flagged as harmful information and/or removed by Facebook from their platform. This message will be delivered right on their News Feed. The message aims to connect people to contents from the World Health Organization (WHO) that debunk COVID-19 myths.

“We want to connect people who may have interacted with harmful misinformation about the virus with the truth from authoritative sources in case they see or hear these claims again off of Facebook.”

– Guy Rosen, VP Integrity

When will the update reflect on Facebook?

There is no specific date yet when this update will be seen, but according to Facebook’s announcement, people will start seeing the messages in the coming weeks.  

Other efforts being done by Facebook

Even before announcement of this upcoming precautionary measure, the company has already taken other steps to prevent or at least lessen the spread of the misleading contents about COVID-19 within their app. Ever since the COVID-19 has been declared a global public health emergency in January, Facebook applied its policy on removing misleading information, which has been practiced since 2018.

The COVID-19 Information Center is just one part of the current efforts done by the company to lead people to the right information. You’ll see this information center at the top of your Facebook app News Feed or you can access it by clicking on the ‘Menu’ button found at the upper right corner of your mobile phone’s screen.

Think Before You Click

While Facebook is doing its part to protect its users from harmful and misleading content about COVID-19, that doesn’t mean that we can already let our guards down and simply believe everything that we see in it and in other social media platforms. On our end, we must do our part – t0 think before we click – and do fact-checking before we take part in spreading the information we see.

May we all be safe not just from the disease itself but also from the misinformation which can also harm us in other ways.

 

SOURCE FACEBOOK APRIL 16, 2020, FACEBOOK MARCH 25, 2020