Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg has said that the social media giant has removed 18 million posts containing misinformation about COVID-19, but would not say how many times the posts had been viewed or shared.
His remarks come as Facebook, as well as other social media platforms, has faced intense criticism for the spread of misinformation, especially regarding the coronavirus pandemic and vaccines.
Speaking with “CBS This Morning” co-host Gayle King in an exclusive interview, the Facebook CEO said: “If we see harmful misinformation on the platform, then we take it down. It’s against our policy.” He also admitted that not everything (misinformation) is completely removed from the platform and there are still mistakes – which they are learning from and trying to improve on – but so far, the 18 million deleted posts are the best they have seen and what their system was able to detect.
Although the founder claims to delete millions of posts, it isn’t clear how many users have seen or viewed the posts. “The number that I have of the top of my head that I can share is the number of pieces of misinformation that we’ve taken action against,” Zuckerberg said.
President Joe Biden said last month that Facebook is “killing people” and the pandemic they are facing is among those who are not yet vaccinated. He later added that Facebook should do something about the spread of false information, especially regarding the vaccine, and not take it personally.
Responding to the president’s remarks, Zuckerberg said that these are just accusations and no given facts. He also claimed that the platform helped increase the number of people who want to get the vaccine.
