Humans come up trumps as Facebook rolls out its solution for fake news

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By Matthew Griffin Connected Society 9th March 2017

WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF

Fake news is now regarded as one of the most politically destabilising developments in recent years, Facebook’s new solution hopes to turn the tide on the fakers

Ironically, for all the amazing things that artificial intelligence (AI) can do, from running Wall Street hedge funds to even running Mark Zuckerberg’s own house, it turns out that when it comes to spotting, and weeding out, fake news humans are still the best alternative. Hah, stupid AI… Yesterday social media giant Facebook announced that it’s launched its much hyped “fake news” crackdown initiative in the US, tagging as “Disputed” the stories that are deemed false by fact checking organisations.

The new feature uses non-partisan third party organisations like Snopes and Politifact to assess the factual accuracy of stories reported as fake by users.

On its help centre page, Facebook has added a question “How is news marked as disputed on Facebook?” However, the section noted that this feature is not yet available to everyone, and it’s unclear how many people currently have access to the “fake news” debunking feature.

The new Disputed tool was first revealed by users on Twitter. Facebook had originally introduced a beta solution to tackle fake news stories last December, amid outcries that so called fake news influenced the outcome of the US presidential election, and now they’ve made it official by partnering with the third party signatories who’ve signed up to the Poynter’s International Fact Checking Code of Principles service that includes ABC News, FactCheck.org, Snopes and Politifact, among others.

Stories that are flagged by Facebook users as ‘fake news’ will now be passed on to these fact checkers for verification, and if the fact checkers agree that the story is misleading, it’ll appear in News Feeds with a “disputed” tag, along with a link to a corresponding article explaining why it might be false. These posts then appear lower in the news feed and users will receive a warning before sharing the story.

Similar efforts are planned in Europe amid threats from the European Union to reduce on the spread of misinformation. The social networking site recently revealed fact checking partnerships in Germany and France ahead of respective elections in each country.

Matthew Griffin / About Author

Matthew Griffin, described as a "Walking encyclopaedia of the future" by NASA and a futurist polymath, is one of the world's most renowned futurists and strategic foresight experts. A serial entrepreneur Matthew is the Founder and Futurist in Chief of the 311 Institute, a global Futures and Deep Futures advisory firm working across the next 50 years, XPotential University, the world's first free futures and foresight university, and the World Futures Forum which works with the United Nations to solve the worlds greatest challenges. 13 times author of the Codex of the Future series, Matthew is an in demand international keynote, acclaimed university lecturer, and host of the hit Fanatical Futurist podcast.

A rare talent in his past Matthew helped build and run several multi-billion dollar business units for Atos, Dell-EMC, and IBM, and his ability to identify, track, and explain the impacts of hundreds of emerging technologies and trends on global business, culture, and society has earned him a powerful reputation and a roster of clients that include royal households, world leaders, G7, G20, and G77+ governments, and many of the world's most respected brands including ABB, Accenture, Adidas, AON, ARM, BCG, Centrica, Citi Group, Coca Cola, Dentons, Deloitte, Disney, EY, KPMG, Lego, Legal & General, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Pepsi Co, Qualcomm, RWE, Samsung, T-Mobile, UBS, VISA, and many others. He was also the only futurist invited to talk at the UN COP28 held in Dubai alongside world leaders.

Regularly featured in the global media including the AP, BBC, Bloomberg, CNBC, Discovery, Forbes, Khaleej Times, Telegraph, TIME, ViacomCBS, WIRED, and the WSJ, Matthews mission is to help organisations create a fair and sustainable future whose benefits are shared by everyone irrespective of their ability, background, or circumstances.