EDITORIAL - Fighting disinformation

In the US presidential race last year, popular video-centered social networking service TikTok took down false content and launched an in-app voting guide.

In the Philippines, Google has announced that it will stop accepting election advertisements, from the official start of the campaign period on Feb. 8 next year until election day, May 9. Google has also committed to expand its information panels on YouTube covering well-established topics that may be prone to disinformation, including the Holocaust, the 9/11 terrorist attacks in the US and martial law under Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines.

Meta, the parent company behind Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, is also coordinating with civil society organizations to address disinformation using its platforms. The civil society groups, however, are urging Google and TikTok to do more to fight the spread of disinformation in the run-up to the 2022 general elections.

The Movement Against Disinformation coalition is urging Google and TikTok to partner with independent fact-checking organizations in the Philippines to promote transparency, accountability and truthful content regarding the country on their platforms. MAD also wants stakeholders to be empowered to provide context in political or issues-based content. The coalition wants content spreading disinformation to be deleted or at least flagged or “pushed down” in the platforms’ algorithm, and barred from being recommended to users.

Tech giants have expressed readiness to keep their platforms from being used to spread disinformation and hateful content. TikTok has partnered with the Commission on Elections for efforts to provide “credible, fact-based content to help Filipino voters make informed choices during the election period.”

These are welcome moves by the tech giants, but there is room for more measures to curb the abuse of social media platforms. The platforms have a stake in fighting disinformation. Credibility is a precious commodity for any company, and credibility is eroded by every bit of disinformation and malicious content.