Facebook, YouTube and Twitter all banned harmful covid-related misinformation as the pandemic took hold throughout the world. But the false claims are still proliferating.On YouTube, the accounts of six out of 12 anti-vaccine activists identified by the Center for Countering Digital Hate as being responsible for creating more than half the anti-vaccine content shared on social media are easily searchable and still posting videos. On Facebook, researchers at the left-leaning advocacy group Avaaz ran an experiment in June in which two brand-new accounts it set up were recommended 109 pages containing anti-vaccine information in just two days.Vaccine rates in the United States have stalled and some cities are reinstituting mask recommendations as coronavirus cases rise again. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy issued a warning last week that vaccine misinformation spreading online was partly responsible for Americans refusing the vaccines, leading to deaths and illness. President Biden, too, has laid part of the blame on social media companies.Researchers agree that social media is playing a role. At the heart of the problem are the companies’ content-recommendation algorithms, which are still generally designed to boost content that engages the most people, regardless of what it is — even conspiracy theories.Story continues below…
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Facebook and YouTube spent a year fighting covid misinformation. It's still spreading.
