Just recently, news had broken out concerning the alleged corruption of Facebook, which is known to be one of the best social networking sites of this generation. The accusation came from the issue where an anonymous Facebook contractor revealed to the public that Facebook employees are known to delete conservative news which is supposed to be displayed on the site’s ‘Trending Topics’ section.
At first, Facebook had stated that the practice will be somewhat close to impossible due to the fact that the matter is actually handled by the system’s algorithm feature, which also serves as additional protection from spam posts and the like. In addition to that, the company had also stated that the Facebook employees could also have edited the articles for proofreading purposes. However, another Facebook contractor is strong to suggest and had also confirmed that the company is known to have a liberal bias, therefore suggesting that the deletion of Conservative news is also being done on a regular basis. Because of this, the US Congress had taken necessary action by directly asking Facebook about this practice.
Last Thursday, the company had answered by sending a 20-page document in The Guardian newspaper that aside from the system’s algorithm itself, there are a few people who are involved with the decision whether the posted articles should be in the Trending section or not. If this is actually the case, chances are that the accusations by the two Facebook contractors do have grounds. In addition to that, the Senate is also quick to point out that the company’s answer is incomplete since Senator Thune had sent the company a request letter asking for details about how the trending news are actually being chosen aside from the list of articles that are filtered by the company itself.
The truth is, when it comes to this case, it actually depends on Facebook whether they decide to post articles on the Trending section or not, some law experts say. This is due to the fact that the company is no doubt protected by the country’s First Amendment, giving it the right to express itself according to its wishes. Needless to say, they won’t be held liable by law even if the company decides not to post something on its site. However, due to the fact that the company had some changes in its former statement, chances are that the company’s stocks will actually be affected by the issue. Since public trust is somewhat compromised, this could potentially impact the company itself.