Founder of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg has said to the BBC that the social platform had and would remove any content which likely to result in “imminent and immediate harm” to users.
He added “Even if something isn’t going to lead to imminent physical harm, we don’t want misinformation to be the content that is going viral”.
Recently Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s statement that scientists had “proved” there was a coronavirus cure was removed from the Facebook.
He also said that “Facebook had removed content from groups claiming that the rollout of the 5G digital network was a cause of the spread of the virus and in some cases encouraged those who believed that to damage the networks physical infrastructure.”
Due to repeatedly violating Facebook policies on harmful misinformation, it removed content from David Icke former broadcaster and conspiracy theorist.
Mr Icke had advocated that 5G mobile phone networks are connected to the spread of the virus and in another video he said a Jewish group was behind the virus.
The founder said: “We work with independent fact checkers. Since the Covid outbreak, they have issued 7,500 notices of misinformation which has led to us issuing 50 million warning labels on posts. We know these are effective because 95% of the time, users don’t click through to the content with a warning label.”
However, Facebook has insisted that unless there was the view of real imminent harm, then the company should and would allow what Mr Zuckerberg called the “widest possible aperture” for freedom of expression on the internet.
Facebook was previously entangled in a political scandal in which millions of its users’ data compromised and ended up in the hands of political interest groups which is including Cambridge Analytica.
However, Mark said Facebook, which also holds Whatsapp and Instagram, was now better prepared than other social media companies, and even governments, to prevent future attempts to effect political outcomes.