Facebook is known as a platform that fights against hate speech, misinformation, and other vices. The online social media platform is now gearing up to take tougher actions these days against claims that portray COVID vaccines in poor light.
All over the world, there is skepticism that vaccines are dangerous for humans to take in. There are efforts already geared towards educating the masses on the importance of vaccines. On the other hand, some are claiming that the vaccines are simply not effective.
The platform is taking a tougher stance on fighting against vaccine information than it had on COVID misinformation. In September 2020, Facebook’s Chief, Mark Zuckerberg said the company would not target and crack down misinformation or anti-vaccination posts the same way it had done on COVID misinformation. Now, it seems all that is changing.
Facebook will take four steps to accomplish its purpose regarding cracking down on misinformation about COVID-19 and vaccinations. This it will do according to guidelines it gets from the World Health Organization.
The first step is to update misinformation policies to bar the posting debunked claims about the vaccines. One such idea is that the vaccines are ineffective, or that they can cause autism. Groups, pages, and individual accounts that repeatedly promote these ideas may be deleted.
The second step is to be proactive as Facebook may directions on how and where people can get vaccinated. The information may be placed on its COVID-19 information center.
Third, the platform will give $120 million in ad credit to help boost health agencies, NGOs, and UN agencies to reach billions of people with the right information about the COVID-19 vaccine and preventive health.
Lastly, Facebook will make it harder to find unchecked vaccine misinformation on its platform by returning validated vaccine information when users search for terms related to debunked claims.
