Supervisory board criticizes Meta for celebrity privileges on Facebook and Instagram

Meta’s supervisory board criticized this Tuesday (6) Facebook and Instagram, platforms of the social networking giant, for giving preferential treatment to problematic content posted by politicians, bosses, celebrities and other personalities.

“The board is concerned about how Meta has placed its economic interests above content moderation,” said the entity classified as independent, but funded by the company.

In its report, the council calls for a significant overhaul of the double-checking program called “cross-checking” to make it more transparent, responsive and fair.

Currently, when posts or images that potentially violate Facebook or Instagram policies are flagged, they are immediately removed if they are deemed too risky and if they come from unknown users.

But if the author is known, that content remains online while it is further scrutinized, a process that often takes several days and sometimes months.

This “unequal” system that operates in two phases “offers additional protections to what certain users express, chosen in part based on Meta’s economic interests”, details the report.

This causes “content identified as contrary to Meta’s rules to remain visible on Facebook and Instagram, while spreading and causing potential harm,” the council warned.

The group recommends speeding up content reviews of personalities who post important human rights messages, and also removing high-risk ones pending an internal verdict.

It also asks the company to publish the selection criteria to benefit from the program and to publicly identify the accounts of these users on the platforms.

The board is made up of 20 international members, including journalists, lawyers, human rights defenders and former political leaders. Its creation in 2020 was proposed by CEO Mark Zuckerberg and is responsible for evaluating the content moderation policy of the Californian group.