President Trump knocked CNN Sunday over a tweet about Facebook’s news quality filters, wondering if it will mean the network will go under.
“Facebook has just stated that they are setting up a system to “purge” themselves of Fake News. Does that mean CNN will finally be put out of business?” Trump said.
Facebook has just stated that they are setting up a system to “purge” themselves of Fake News. Does that mean CNN will finally be put out of business?
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 21, 2018
The tweet comes after Fox News reported on Facebook's team of individuals that will be “safeguarding” the election.
According to a New York Times report, the social media giant will soon have a team of 20 people “focused on rooting out disinformation, monitoring false news and deleting fake accounts that may be trying to influence voters before elections in the United States, Brazil and other countries.”
The misuse of Facebook by foreign influence campaigns has been rampant. In July and August, the company detailed previously undisclosed efforts by Iranians and Russians to mislead users of the social network through divisive ads and posts. Now, with the midterm elections in the United States just seven weeks away, Facebook is in an all-out sprint to convince the world that it is ready to handle any new attempts at such meddling. The company is under tremendous pressure to prevent a repeat of the foreign manipulation that unfolded on the social network during the 2016 presidential campaign. (NYT)
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“We see this as probably the biggest companywide reorientation since our shift from desktops to mobile phones,” Samidh Chakrabarti, head of Facebook’s elections and civic engagement team, told the Times, noting that the company “mobilized to make this happen.”
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