The 2020 Presidential elections, unlike any other, is well-backed by all the major giants in social media; Facebook, Twitter, and Google! Find out how!
What led these social media companies to take the necessary steps?
These companies found themselves in the middle of criticisms coming from all directions concerning the 2020 US elections. Different sides had their own different reasons to criticize. While the Conservatives accused them of suppressing the freedom of speech, the Liberals accused them of not taking desired actions against election misinformation. The tech giants have denied such accusations.
Irrespective of that, the company themselves saw a surge of inaccurate news regarding vote counts. One of the Facebook spokeswomen stated that as the election proceeded, they were witnessing increasing misinformation that could have adverse effects on the public. On that account, Facebook is taking the desired steps to work against misinformation. Their primary target is to restrict the content from reaching more people.
Being at the forefront of social media, all the major social media giants are taking necessary steps to contribute to the peaceful and proper processing of elections, unlike the 2016 one.
Starting With The Most Famous Social Media, Facebook
Facebook (and Instagram)
- They created an option to turn off all political ads both on Facebook and Instagram before the elections.
- An online hub was introduced on both social media platforms precisely for American users. This provided them the right information about the elections like the process and deadlines of voting. Mark Zuckerberg, the Facebook CEO, said that this feature contributed to about 4.4 million Americans voting.
- All the misleading fake accounts are specifically targeted by them. They also found some having Russian and Iranian ties, specifically working to create election commotion. All of these are getting removed.
- The forwarding of anything related to the election is limited on Facebook, Messenger, and Watsapp.
How has Another Major Social Media, Twitter, Contributed?
- They took a very decisive step in banning all political ads. This is seen as the most rigid move by a social media company to date.
- Twitter has introduced an option of warning and to think twice before a disputed content is shared by the users. They have introduced ways that make an effort in directing the users towards more trustworthy pages, election-wise.
Along with other measures, they have introduced some features in their popular search engine. The auto-complete-blocking feature works in a way that it automatically completes the sentences and blocks the suggestions, (election-related).
The 2016 American elections were turned into an online battleground by the Russian trolls. This has led social media, particularly, Facebook, Twitter, and Google to be very aware of the misinformation regarding elections or anything that can prove to be a breeding ground for negativity. They are now well equipped to tackle them.
