Census 2020 Tests Social-Media Giants' Ability to Combat Disinformation
January 02 2020 - 10:39AM
Dow Jones News
By Sarah E. Needleman
Social-media companies that have spent months pledging to
bolster their defenses against the spread of misinformation through
their platforms ahead of this year's presidential election are
about to get a first big test, the U.S. census.
Facebook Inc. and Google parent Alphabet Inc. have barred ads
containing inaccurate information about the decadal count of people
living in the U.S. that starts this month. They also have said they
would prohibit content designed to spread misinformation about the
time, means or eligibility requirements for participating in the
process.
Twitter Inc. and Reddit Inc. have started working with
nonprofits and others to help ensure information on their platforms
doesn't discourage people from participating.
The U.S. Census Bureau has set up a trust-and-safety team to
protect the integrity of the count. That team, it said, was working
with the social-media companies and others to combat false and
misleading information.
Stephen Buckner, assistant director of communications for the
Census Bureau, has said the agency is worried that foreign or
domestic individuals or groups that he didn't otherwise identify
may try using social networks to deter people from participating in
the census. The companies have pledged to quickly deal with posts
the agency's team identifies as potentially harmful to the
count.
"What the social-media platforms need to do is ensure the right
information is available to people," said Joan Donovan, director of
research at Harvard University's Shorenstein Center on Media,
Politics and Public Policy. Truthful content should show up at the
top of search results, for example, and false information should be
removed, something the big social networks traditionally haven't
done well, she said.
Arriving at accurate census numbers is important because the
effort required by law every 10 years influences the redistribution
of seats in the House of Representatives and allows states to
redraw congressional, legislative and local political
districts.
"Disinformation campaigns designed to discourage participation
in the census stand as a real threat to the full and accurate
census that we are working hard to achieve in 2020," Kristen
Clarke, president and executive director of the National Lawyers'
Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, said. "These campaigns can
have a particularly negative impact on communities of color and
young people who are overrepresented among the hard-to-count
communities."
Social-media platforms are under particular scrutiny after a
Senate committee report in October criticized U.S. tech companies
for helping spread disinformation during the 2016 election.
Lawmakers called for better coordination of efforts to prevent such
activity in the 2020 election.
The battle between those seeking to spread disinformation and
the tech companies trying to stamp out such content has turned into
somewhat of an arms race. Manipulators are continuously adopting
new techniques and tools to stay ahead of the platform operators,
according to researchers. For example, researchers say,
manipulators can convince others to attempt to vote in a federal
election via text message, even though that isn't possible.
Ahead of the 2020 census, some tech companies have revamped
their policies to make it clear to both users and advertisers what
they consider unacceptable content related to the count.
Facebook, as part of its ad policy, said advertisers won't be
allowed to portray census participation as useless or meaningless.
It is requiring all census-related ads to identify who is funding
them, not unlike the kind of messages that candidates have to
include in campaign ads.
Facebook said it won't allow posts falsely stating that
completing the survey will result in law-enforcement consequences.
Alphabet said it is applying similar rules to videos and comments
on YouTube. It also will take steps to ensure misleading
information isn't channeled through Google search, Gmail and the
Google Play app store.
Politicians who violate Facebook's census policies will have the
offending posts or ads removed, the company said. That stance
contrasts with how it handles most content from politicians, where
it has said it wouldn't censor speech.
"We are also using our operations center for real-time
monitoring of potential census interference so that we can quickly
address any abuse," Facebook said in a blog post.
Twitter, in November, held a three-hour workshop in Washington,
D.C., for community groups and nonprofits on the spread of
misleading information online and how the company's policies on
that matter will apply to the census count. "We continue to be
engaged with Census Bureau leadership on how we can work with them
and host future events," a company spokeswoman said.
Reddit, between September and December, hosted eight "Ask Me
Anything" sessions about the census on its platform. Users were
given the opportunity to ask questions about the count and get
immediate answers from participating civil-rights groups,
nonprofits and government agencies whose work touches on the
census. More than 85,000 users participated.
"The goal is to demystify the process of the census and give
Redditors an opportunity to engage directly with people in the know
about this process," said a spokeswoman for the message board.
Write to Sarah E. Needleman at sarah.needleman@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 02, 2020 10:24 ET (15:24 GMT)
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