Meta is finally trying to protect teens from 'suspicious adults' on Instagram and Facebook
In an effort to better protect underaged users, Meta is adjusting the default privacy settings on Facebook and Instagram to limit contact by “suspicious adults.”
Now, whenever a teenager joins Facebook, their account will automatically have more stringent privacy protections. This includes, but is not limited to, deciding who can see their friends list, what pages they follow, and who is allowed to comment on their posts. For accounts created before this update, Meta states it will begin pushing those users to adopt those same settings, but won’t force it. If all this sounds familiar, that’s because Instagram implemented very similar changes back in 2021 to protect young people there.
Power to the user
Meta goes on to say it’s working on new ways to stop blocked and reported accounts from contacting underaged
One way it'll do this on Instagram is by, as part of a test, removing the message button, making it impossible for predatory adults to use Instagram messaging to contact teen users directly.
Plus, the People You May Know recommendations feed on Facebook will also no longer display these flagged accounts.
Coming to both Messenger and Instagram is a new notification encouraging teenagers to use safety tools anytime they feel “uncomfortable” during a conversation. One notification will ask users if they know the person who just messaged them. If ‘No’ is chosen, both apps will bring up a series of actions they can take, like blocking the account or reporting them.
According to the announcement, the new Facebook default privacy settings are rolling out today (Nov. 21); presumably, so are the other changes. We reached out to Meta for clarification. This story will be updated if we hear back.
In addition to the update, Meta announced it’s partnering up with the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children (NCMEC) to create a new platform to “prevent [teenagers’] intimate images from being posted online” and spreading across the internet. It aims to help underaged users “regain control” of these leaked images while also discouraging those acts in the first place.
Mixed messaging
While it’s great to see more security features being added, Meta’s recent track record on privacy has been confusing. On one hand, the company improved Instagram’s blocking system to stop trolls from harassing you further back in October. But at the same time, the platform implemented a new precise location feature that can make users vulnerable to stalkers or theft.
It’s a rather mixed message that could lead to privacy problems for all users; especially teenagers. Because of that, be sure to check out TechRadar’s best parental control app for 2022.
Facebook Will No Longer Ask For Your Political And Religious Views
Facebook will soon remove four information fields from user profiles, including Religious Views, Political Views, Address, and Interested In.
Facebook will soon remove four information fields from user profiles, ostensibly as part of its plans to streamline the platform. Facebook is the world's largest social media network, with 2.96 million users worldwide as of Q3 2022. However, over the past few years, the company has been losing its young userbase, with many of them migrating to newer platforms like TikTok and Snapchat. Under increasing pressure from competitors, Facebook has been implementing several changes, including a heightened focus on short-form videos following a historic plunge in its stock price earlier this year.
While Facebook remains the biggest cash cow for its parent company Meta, it is no longer a priority area for CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Instead, Zuckerberg has been focused on the metaverse over the past few years, investing billions of dollars in the technology despite a lukewarm response from mainstream consumers. The company is believed to have already invested a whopping $36 billion on the project, with billions more expected to be poured into it in the coming years. As part of its persistent bullishness on virtual and augmented reality, Meta has also been launching many VR headsets, including the $1,499 Meta Quest Pro last month.
A Facebook spokesperson has confirmed to TechCrunch that from Dec. 1, the company will remove four fields from user profiles to make the platform "easier to navigate and use." The four fields are 'Religious Views, Political Views, Address, and Interested In.' The company says it is sending notifications to users, letting them know of the impending change. The messages, however, are only going out to people who have these fields filled out. "This change doesn’t affect anyone’s ability to share this information about themselves elsewhere on Facebook," the spokesperson said.
Facebook's Upcoming Change
The news was first reported earlier this week by social media consultant Matt Navarra, who tweeted a screenshot of Facebook's message about the impending change. The notice also says that the rest of the profile information on the user's bio will remain untouched. As can be seen from the message, Facebook is also giving users the chance to download a copy of their Facebook data in its current state, before the four fields are removed from their profile.
The change will bring Facebook in line with other major social media platforms like TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, and Snapchat that have a more streamlined profile page and do not ask users for their religious and political views. Since none of these are dating apps, they also don't need users to specify what genders they're interested in for potential partners. As for the address, it is a privacy risk for Facebook users, especially with the various scandals and data leaks that the company has been involved in over the years.
NEXT:How To Delete A Photo Or Video From Your Facebook Story
Source: TechCrunch, Matt Navarra/Twitter
Former U.S President Donald Trump announced his 2024 reelection bid on Nov. 15, 2022.
Nur Ibrahim
SNOPES
Published Nov 17, 2022
Ahead of former U.S. President Donald Trump's Nov. 15, 2022, announcement that he would run for reelection in 2024, a Meta memo reiterated that his speeches would be exempt from third-party fact-checking efforts on Facebook.
The memo, which was obtained and reported on by CNN, stated that if Trump were to announce a reelection bid, he would no longer be fact-checked on Facebook's platform by its third-party fact-checkers (Meta is Facebook's parent company). The memo stated that "political speech is ineligible for fact-checking. This includes the words a politician says as well as photo, video, or other content that is clearly labeled as created by the politician or their campaign."
The memo explained: "If former president Trump makes a clear, public announcement that he is running for office, he would be considered a politician under our program policies." This rule applies to all politicians. According to Facebook's official policy, partners in the company's fact-checker program should not rate the following types of content:
Posts and ads from politicians: This includes the words a politician says as well as photo, video, or other content that is clearly labeled as created by the politician or their campaign. In evaluating when this applies, we ask our fact-checking partners to look at politicians at every level. We define a "politician" as candidates running for office, current office holders — and, by extension, many of their cabinet appointees — along with political parties and their leaders. In some cases, we ask fact-checkers to use their expertise and judgment to determine whether an individual is a politician, like in the case of a part-time elected official.
Elaborating on the company's policy, Meta stated:
Our approach is grounded in Facebook's fundamental belief in free expression, respect for the democratic process, and the belief that, especially in mature democracies with a free press, political speech is the most scrutinized speech there is. Just as critically, by limiting political speech we would leave people less informed about what their elected officials are saying and leave politicians less accountable for their words.
[...]
Opinion content is generally not eligible for rating because the fact-checking program is not meant to interfere with individual expression or debate. However, the definition of "opinion" is not meant to give a free pass to content that spreads false information, solely on the basis of how it is presented. Therefore, we ask fact-checkers to use their judgment to determine whether content is actually opinion or rather masking false information in the guise of opinion, and to rate it as appropriate in these circumstances.
This policy is not new. It was on Facebook's website before Trump's announcement. Andy Stone, a spokesperson for Meta, said to CNN, "a reiteration of our long-standing policy should not be news to anyone." In 2019, Nick Clegg, the president of global affairs at Meta, confirmed that the policy had been in place since 2018. Addressing the platform's rules for fact-checking political speech, he said:
We don't believe, however, that it's an appropriate role for us to referee political debates and prevent a politician's speech from reaching its audience and being subject to public debate and scrutiny. That's why Facebook exempts politicians from our third-party fact-checking program. We have had this policy on the books for over a year now, posted publicly on our site under our eligibility guidelines. This means that we will not send organic content or ads from politicians to our third-party fact-checking partners for review. However, when a politician shares previously debunked content including links, videos and photos, we plan to demote that content, display related information from fact-checkers, and reject its inclusion in advertisements.
Trump is currently banned on the platform, though "Team Trump," a page run by his team, is still up. Meta says it will assess the circumstances and possibly consider allowing him back on the platform in January 2023.
Meta pays independent third-party fact-checkers to apply fact-check labels on Facebook and Instagram. These fact-checkers are certified by the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN). (We should note that Snopes is a member of the IFCN but is not a part of the Facebook partnership.) We have reached out to IFCN for more information and will update this post if we hear back.
We also spoke to Jevin West, an associate professor at the University of Washington and a co-founder of the Center for an Informed Public, about this policy.
"The policy is problematic and inconsistent," West said. "You are fact-checking all these other [claims], but you are not fact-checking the things said by people with humongous microphones. You are tying the hands of your fact checkers. [...] Some of the most egregious statements come from our politicians."
This policy is probably in place so that Meta does not "alienate users coming from different sides of the political spectrum," West theorized. He also argued that Meta makes a lot of money on political advertising: "It is hard not to think that this could be part of the reason for this policy as well."
But for West, another Facebook policy was potentially more problematic: the one pertaining to content demotion. As per Meta: "When a politician shares a specific piece of content — e.g. a link to an article, video or photo created by someone else that has been previously debunked on Facebook — we will demote that content, display a warning and reject its inclusion in ads."
West argued that this particular element of the policy could possibly make users more distrustful of information posted on Facebook, as it does not appear to have any transparency behind it. "It is a black box," he said. "There is this idea that they don't want to 'referee political debates,' but but they are already doing that, so why exclude some of the biggest voices?"
Sources:
Duffy, Kate. "Facebook Won't Be Fact-Checking Donald Trump Now He's Announced He's Running for President in 2024." Business Insider, https://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-trump-fact-checking-halted-presidential-run-2024-announced-meta-2022-11
"How Meta's Third-Party Fact-Checking Program Works." How Meta's Third-Party Fact-Checking Program Works, https://www.facebook.com/facebookmedia
"Fact-Checking Policies on Facebook." Facebook, https://www.facebook.com/business/help/315131736305613?id=673052479947730 Accessed 16 Nov. 2022.
O'Sullivan, Donie. "Facebook Fact-Checkers Will Stop Checking Trump after Presidential Bid Announcement | CNN Politics." CNN, 15 Nov. 2022, https://www.cnn.com/2022/11/15/politics/facebook-fact-check-donald-trump/index.html
O'Sullivan, Donie. "Facebook Says Trump Now Suspended until at Least January 2023 | CNN Business." CNN, 4 June 2021,
By Nur Ibrahim
Nur Nasreen Ibrahim is a reporter with experience working in television, international news coverage, fact checking, and creative writing.
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