In yet another step to combat misinformation, social media conglomerate Facebook will now be taking the step of calling out pages that repeatedly spread fake news. According to Mashable, if a user tries to like such a page, then they will see a pop-up saying that the page has "repeatedly shared false information," and that "independent fact-checkers said the information is false." The user will then be presented with a choice of going back to the previous page or following the page anyway.
There will also be a "learn more" link which will provide some more information on why this page has been labeled as such, as well as another "learn more" link which will provide more info on Facebook's fact-checking program.
The company also said it would expand penalties for individual Facebook accounts that repeatedly share misinformation, in the sense that other users will see less of them in their News Feed. Facebook has even redesigned the notifications that pop up when users share content that fact-checkers have labeled as false. The notification will now include the fact-checkers article that explains why the post is misleading, together with an option to share that article.
Users will also be notified those posts from users who repeatedly share fake news will be positioned lower in the News Feed, making it less likely for other users to see them.
In the past couple of years, Facebook has been introducing a number of measures to combat misinformation on the platform. As per Mashable, these include introducing message forwarding limits on Messenger, encouraging users to read an article before sharing it, putting warning labels on fake news, and most famously, blocking Donald Trump from using the platform. Despite these efforts, the company still has a long way to go before it can say it's really gotten rid of fake news.
