{"id":8743,"date":"2021-11-03T12:32:42","date_gmt":"2021-11-03T12:32:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/TheNextWeb=1371950"},"modified":"2021-11-03T12:32:42","modified_gmt":"2021-11-03T12:32:42","slug":"facebook-is-blocking-researchers-access-to-data-about-how-much-misinformation-it-hosts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.londonchiropracter.com\/?p=8743","title":{"rendered":"Facebook is blocking researchers\u2019 access to data about how much misinformation it hosts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Leaked internal documents suggest Facebook \u2013 which recently renamed itself Meta \u2013 is doing far worse than it claims<\/a> at minimizing COVID-19 vaccine misinformation on the Facebook social media platform.<\/p>\n

Online misinformation about the virus and vaccines is a major concern. In one study, survey respondents who got some or all of their news from Facebook were significantly more likely to resist the COVID-19 vaccine<\/a> than those who got their news from mainstream media sources.<\/p>\n

As a researcher who studies social and civic media<\/a>, I believe it\u2019s critically important to understand how misinformation spreads online. But this is easier said than done. Simply counting instances of misinformation found on a social media platform leaves two key questions unanswered: How likely are users to encounter misinformation and are certain users especially likely to be affected by misinformation? These questions are the denominator problem and the distribution problem.<\/p>\n

The COVID-19 misinformation study, \u201cFacebook\u2019s Algorithm: a Major Threat to Public Health<\/a>\u201d, published by public interest advocacy group Avaaz in August 2020, reported that sources that frequently shared health misinformation \u2014 82 websites and 42 Facebook pages \u2014 had an estimated total reach of 3.8 billion views in a year.<\/p>\n

At first glance, that\u2019s a stunningly large number. But it\u2019s important to remember that this is the numerator<\/a>. To understand what 3.8 billion views in a year means, you also have to calculate the denominator<\/a>. The numerator is the part of a fraction above the line, which is divided by the part of the fraction below line, the denominator.<\/p>\n

Getting some perspective<\/h2>\n

One possible denominator is 2.9 billion monthly active Facebook users<\/a>, in which case, on average, every Facebook user has been exposed to at least one piece of information from these health misinformation sources. But these are 3.8 billion content views, not discrete users. How many pieces of information does the average Facebook user encounter in a year? Facebook does not disclose that information.<\/p>\n

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<\/i><\/a>Without knowing the denominator, a numerator doesn\u2019t tell you very much. The Conversation U.S., CC BY-ND<\/figcaption>