Social media giant Facebook (NASDAQ: FB) is planning to stop its policy that globally received a lot of criticisms. The policy is used to shield politicians from rules of content moderation. The change that is going to kickstart before Friday comes after Facebook’s Oversight Board’s review. The group reviewed Facebook’s content rulings. Although the board supported the decision related to the account of Donald Trump, former president of the United Nations, it condemned the favorable treatment given to other politicians. The board said that rules should be the same for everyone. Facebook has been given time up to the 5th of June to reply to the recommendations of policy.
Facebook is also planning to empower users by alerting them when they tend to violate the rules that could result in the suspension of their account. Some news agencies also reported when the company’s staff intervened to safeguard pages related to political stuff from penalties.
For Facebook, these transformations are notable. Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, said that the company should refrain from policing politicians’ speech. The company executives, including the CEO, said that speeches given by politicians are already scrutinized, and private players should refrain from censoring the words of politicians.
The Policy
Facebook maintains a record of political accounts for some years that don’t face content moderation protocol or face-checking processes that apply to others. In 2019 some employees of the firm asked to dissolve the list. They argued that some people fall to false information shared by elected officials. However, Nick Clegg, vice president of global affairs for Facebook, defended the policy, saying that the company treats politicians’ speech newsworthy. He further added that the company will only take action against politicians’ comments to cause physical harm.
News or videos shared by the politicians that they usually take from other portals is also checked. According to the new rules of Facebook, posts that the politicians directly post would undergo the fact-checking process.
Moreover, the new policy also mentions that the company could exempt some posts from taking them down. However, Facebook will disclose when it will do that.
