Already known for its “fact-checking” of controversial issues such as the outcome of the 2020 presidential election and COVID-19, Facebook now will mobilize a panel of scholars to “debunk myths about climate change.”
CNBC described Facebook’s move as “further leaning in to the ‘arbiter of truth’ role that the company once renounced.”
The experts will come from the likes of the University of Cambridge, George Mason University and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication.
Facebook announced Thursday, CNBC reported, it will add a section to its climate change information hub that will features facts, misconceptions and falsehoods. The social media giant, for example, will state as “fact” the disputed claim that polar bear populations are declining because of “global warming.”
Bloomberg reported Facebook will begin labeling some user posts that mention climate change in the same way it has annotated posts discussing the election and COVID-19.
The bolstering of its “fact-checking” is a futher move away from the statement of CEO Mark Zuckerberg last May.
Defending free speech, he said he did not think Facebook and other internet platforms “in general should be arbiters of truth.”
Now Zuckerberg argues, according to Bloomberg, that the best way to stop the spread of misinformation on its platform is not only to remove “misleading” posts, but to offer people “accurate information from authoritative sources.”
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