In partnership with Pesa Check, Facebook has announced the expansion of its third-party fact-checking program to cover Ethiopia, Burundi and Mali.
This program has Joining 15 countries across Sub-Saharan Africa, Facebook’s third-party fact-checking program forms part of its ongoing work in helping assess the accuracy and quality of news people find on Facebook, whilst reducing the spread of misinformation on its platform.
Working with Pesa Check, part of a network of fact-checking organizations certified in content by the non-partisan International Fact-Checking Network, local articles will be fact-checked alongside the verification of photos and videos, with feedback from the Facebook community also forming one of many signals Facebook uses to raise potentially false stories to fact-checkers for review.
Once Pesa Check fact-checks a news story, this will be shown in related articles immediately below the story in News Feed. Page Admins and people on Facebook will also receive notifications if they try to share a story or have
shared one in the past that’s been determined to be false, empowering people to decide for themselves what to read, trust, and share the information that party gated.
Commenting on the program expansion Kojo Boakye, Facebook Public Policy Director, Africa, said “Fighting the spread of false news on Facebook is a responsibility that we take seriously. We are pleased that our third-party fact-checking program now covers Ethiopia, Burundi and Mali and that the program is available in 18 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa. Africa is important to Facebook and this program expansion demonstrates our ongoing commitment to the continent.
Eric Mugendi, Managing Editor from Pesa Check and Justin Arenstien, Code for Africa Director added: “Pesa Check is excited to be expanding its fact-checking partnership with Facebook.
So far from our work in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, we are seeing real positive results in our interactions with publishers and the public. We are optimistic that we will get the same feedback in Ethiopia, Burundi and Mali.
This project will also help our fact-checks reach a far larger audience which will enable us to help curb the spread of false information in Africa.
In October last year, Facebook announced the expansion of its third-party fact-checking program to cover 3 more countries across Sub-Saharan Africa in addition to the 5 countries already supported.
Today’s expansion brings the total to 18 countries in Sub-Saharan Africa where the program has been deployed.
The Ethiopian Herald April 28/2020
BY MUSSA MUHAMMED
