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A12 TECHNOLOGY
Saturday 7 November 2020
Did social media actually counter election misinformation?

By MATT O'BRIEN and MAE premature victory in spe-
ANDERSON cific states.
AP Technology Writers The Twitter and Facebook
Ahead of the election, actions were a step in the
Facebook, Twitter and You- right direction, but not that
Tube promised to clamp effective — particularly in
down on election misinfor- Twitter's case, said Jennifer
mation, including unsub- Grygiel, a professor at Syra-
stantiated charges of fraud cuse University and social
and premature declara- media expert.
tions of victory by candi- That's because tweets from
dates. And they mostly did major figures can get almost
just that — though not with- instant traction, Grygiel
out a few hiccups. said. So even though Twit-
But overall their measures ter labeled Trump's tweets
still didn't really address about "being up big," and
the problems exposed by votes being cast after polls
the 2020 U.S. presidential closed and others, by the
contest, critics of the social time the label appeared,
platforms contend. several minutes after the
"We're seeing exactly what tweet, the misinformation
we expected, which is not This image combo shows the logos of Google, Twitter, YouTube TV and Facebook. had already spread. One
enough, especially in the Associated Press Wednesday Trump tweet
case of Facebook," said falsely complaining that
Shannon McGregor, an as- warnings to see them and people to accept it once cast ballots in person. Mail vote counters were "work-
sistant professor of journal- limiting the ability to share it's there," she said. ballots can take longer to ing hard" to make his lead
ism and media at the Uni- them. Trump wasn't alone in at- process than ballots cast at in the Pennsylvania count
versity of North Carolina. The video-sharing app Tik- tracting such labels. Re- polling places. "disappear" wasn't labeled
One big test emerged ear- Tok, popular with young publican U.S. Sen. Thom In a Sept. 3 post, Facebook for more than 15 minutes,
ly Wednesday morning as people, said it pulled down Tillis got a label on Twitter CEO Mark Zuckerberg said and was not obscured.
vote-counting continued in some videos Wednesday for declaring a premature that if a candidate or cam- "Twitter can't really en-
battleground states includ- from high-profile accounts reelection victory in North paign tries to declare vic- force policies if they don't
ing Wisconsin, Michigan that were making elec- Carolina. The same thing tory before the results are do it before it happens, in
and Pennsylvania. Presi- tion fraud allegations, say- happened to a Demo- in, the social network would the case of the president,"
dent Donald Trump made ing they violated the app's cratic official claiming that label their post to note that Grygiel said. "When a tweet
a White House appear- policies on misleading infor- former Vice President Joe official results are not yet hits the wire, essentially,
ance before cheering sup- mation. For Facebook and Biden had won Wisconsin. in and directing people to it goes public. It already
porters, declaring he would YouTube, it mostly meant The flurry of Trump claims the official results. brings this full force of im-
challenge the poll results. attaching authoritative in- that began early Wednes- But Facebook limited that pact of market reaction."
He also posted mislead- formation to election-relat- day morning continued policy to official candi- Grygiel suggested that
ing statements about the ed posts. after the sun rose over dates and campaigns de- for prominent figures like
election on Facebook and For instance, Google- Washington. By late morn- claring premature victory Trump, Twitter could pre-
Twitter, following months owned YouTube showed ing, Trump was tweeting an in the overall election. Posts moderate posts by delay-
of signaling his unfounded video of Trump's White unfounded complaint that that declared premature ing publication until a hu-
doubts about expanded House remarks suggesting his early lead in some states victory in specific states man moderator can de-
mail-in voting and his de- fraud and premature victo- seemed to "magically dis- were flagged with a gener- cide whether it needs a
sire for final election results ries, just as some traditional appear" as the night went al notification about where label. That means flagged
when polls closed on Nov. news channels did. But on and more ballots were to find election information tweets would publish with
3. Google placed an "infor- counted. but not warnings that the a label, making it more dif-
So what did tech compa- mation panel" beneath the Twitter quickly slapped that information was false or ficult to spread unlabeled
nies do about it? For the videos noting that election with a warning that said misleading. misinformation, especially
most part, what they said results may not be final and "some or all of the content Facebook also issued a during important events
they would, which primar- linking to Google's election shared in this Tweet is dis- blanket statement on the like the election.
ily meant labeling false or results page with additional puted and might be mis- top of Facebook and Insta- This is less of an issue on
misleading election posts information. leading about an election gram feeds on Wednesday Facebook or YouTube,
in order to point users to "They're just appending this or other civic process." It noting that the votes for where people are less likely
reliable information. In little label to the president's was among a series of such the U.S. presidential elec- to interact with posts in real
Twitter's case, that some- posts, but they're append- warnings Twitter applied tion are still being counted. time. YouTube could be-
times meant obscuring the ing those to any politician to Trump tweets Wednes- Twitter was a bit more pro- come more of an issue over
offending posts, forcing talking about the elec- day, which make it harder active. Based on its " civic the next few days, Grygiel
readers to click through tion," said McGregor, who for viewers to see the posts integrity policy," imple- suggested, if Trump's false
blamed both the tech gi- without first reading the mented last month, Twitter claims are adopted by
ants and traditional me- warning. said it would label and re- YouTubers who are analyz-
dia outlets for shirking their Much of the slowdown in duce the visibility of Tweets ing the election.
responsibility to curb the the tabulation of results containing "false or mis- "Generally, platforms have
spread of misinformation had been widely forecast- leading information about policies in place that are
about the election results ed for months, because civic processes" in order an attempt to do some-
instead of amplifying a the coronavirus pandemic to provide more context. thing, but at the end of the
falsehood just because the led many states to make It labeled Trump's tweets day it proved to be pretty
president said it. it easier to vote by mail, declaring premature vic- ineffective," Grygiel said.
"Allowing any false claim and millions chose to do so tory as well as claims from "The president felt empow-
to spread can lead more rather than venturing out to Trump and others about ered to make claims."q