Facebook, in cooperation with the Raskrinkavanje.me portal (Center for Democratic Transition) and the Agence France-Presse (AFP), is launching an independent fact-checking program in Montenegro.
These programs are also being launched in Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia and Croatia, in cooperation with organizations like Raskrinkavanje.me and AFP, are members of the International Fact-Checking Network.
To fight against misinformation, the fact-checking organization will be marking some information as false and it will be displayed lower in the news feed, which will significantly reduce its visibility and further sharing.
Thus, they claim that the spread of false news is prevented and the number of people who see them is reduced. Also, the distribution of content to pages and domains that continuously share fake news will be reduced, and the possibility for advertising and monetizing content will be abolished. This means that when a post is marked as fake, we will warn people who see it or try to share it that the post is marked as fake.
“We are happy to have launched our independent fact-checking program in Montenegro, together with Raskrinkavanje.me, and AFP. The fight against fake news is a responsibility that we take seriously and that is why we are constantly working on how to help stop the spread of misinformation on our platformâ€, said Sophie Eyears, strategic partner development manager for Facebook.
This program is in line with Facebook’s framework for improving the quality and veracity of content in news reviews, which provides for the removal of accounts and content that violate Facebook’s community standards or advertising policies, reducing the distribution of fake news and untrue content.
“The Center for Democratic Transition launched the Raskrinkavanje.me platform in 2018, to increase the quality of media content, respect for professional standards, and the responsibility of the media in Montenegro. We analyze media articles that we suspect contain inaccurate information, misinformation, or fake news. The verification is based on a detailed and tested methodology. We believe that this cooperation with Facebook will significantly contribute to the citizens of Montenegro receiving more accurate and verified information”, said Milica KovaÄević from the Raskrinkavanje.me portal.
“We are delighted to be able to expand our global partnership with Facebook in the fight against misinformation. The launch of our offices in Bosnia, Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia testifies to AFP’s important role as a media partner in this area. With more than 80 professional journalists deployed in 37 countries, we represent one of the world’s largest networks of journalists dedicated to digital verification and demystification of false information spread through the Internetâ€, said Christine Buhagiar, AFP’s Regional Director for Europe.
Facebook announced that it now has more than 70 fact-checking partners in more than 70 languages ​​globally and that they are interested in further expanding those activities.