The Good Law Project has launched a campaign to tackle disinformation on Meta, the owner of Facebook, Instagram and Threads, accusing Mark Zuckerberg’s platforms of making money ‘out of feeding us disinformation and dodgy ads through its recommender algorithms’.
It states that ‘Instagram, Facebook and Threads are full of disinformation and conspiracy theories, much of which is paid content’, adding: “These are all platforms owned by the billionaire tech bro and buddy of Donald Trump, Mark Zuckerberg.”
At the beginning of the year it was announced by Meta that it was abandoning the use of independent fact checkers on Facebook and Instagram, in a bid to cosy up to Trump.
Trump and his Republican allies have previously criticised Meta for its fact-checking policy, calling it censorship of right-wing voices.
The Good Law Project states: “Things were already bad enough before Zuckerberg sacked the fact checkers, but now his platforms are like the wild west. Not so much about freedom of speech as the freedom to make money out of feeding us disinformation and dodgy ads through its recommender algorithms.”
The organisation says that it is working with tech legal experts at AWO, to demand Meta answers a simple question: ‘Why is it forcing UK users to accept invasive paid content?’
Users are being asked to tell Meta to stop targeting them with paid content.
You can find a link to the campaign here.
Basit Mahmood is editor of Left Foot Forward
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