Facebook employees protest in a letter against the toleration of politicians' lies in advertisements.

A few days ago, Mark Zuckerberg explained why politicians' lies are not removed on Facebook. “ When politicians lie, the public should know ,” said Zuckerberg. Although Facebook already fact-checks ads, this should not happen with political ads.

The Facebook founder received strong criticism from his own employees for this regulation. Two weeks ago, more than 250 employees wrote a letter to Zuckerberg demanding that future candidates for political office no longer be allowed to spread lies in advertisements. The employees are proud to work for Facebook, but the letter says:

“We are reaching out to you, the leaders of our company, because we are concerned that we are in the process of undoing the great steps our product teams have taken toward our integrity over the past two years.”

The letter makes it clear that employees are seriously concerned, as it goes on to say, “Free speech is not the same as paid speech.” These policies allow politicians to weaponize Facebook by targeting people who believe politicians only publish trustworthy content.

[mk_ad]

Of course, there are also suggestions to improve the existing regulations. Among other things, it is proposed that the same standards should apply to ads from politicians as to all other ads on Facebook. This would mean that their truthfulness would be checked. The proposals also include a stronger visual distinction between political advertisements and others.

A Facebook spokeswoman has already commented on the letter, but with little chance of success. She told the Wall Street Journal that they still don't want to censor political speech and are looking for ways to make political ads more transparent.

Source: Neue Züricher Zeitung
Article image: Shutterstock / By Frederic Legrand – COMEO
Author: Nicole Reimuth

Also interesting:


If you enjoyed this post and value the importance of well-founded information, become part of the exclusive Mimikama Club! Support our work and help us promote awareness and combat misinformation. As a club member you receive:

📬 Special Weekly Newsletter: Get exclusive content straight to your inbox.
🎥 Exclusive video* “Fact Checker Basic Course”: Learn from Andre Wolf how to recognize and combat misinformation.
📅 Early access to in-depth articles and fact checks: always be one step ahead.
📄 Bonus articles, just for you: Discover content you won't find anywhere else.
📝 Participation in webinars and workshops : Join us live or watch the recordings.
✔️ Quality exchange: Discuss safely in our comment function without trolls and bots.

Join us and become part of a community that stands for truth and clarity. Together we can make the world a little better!

* In this special course, Andre Wolf will teach you how to recognize and effectively combat misinformation. After completing the video, you have the opportunity to join our research team and actively participate in the education - an opportunity that is exclusively reserved for our club members!


Notes:
1) This content reflects the current state of affairs at the time of publication. The reproduction of individual images, screenshots, embeds or video sequences serves to discuss the topic. 2) Individual contributions were created through the use of machine assistance and were carefully checked by the Mimikama editorial team before publication. ( Reason )