Meta, Facebook | Facebook dropped news in Canada: – Replaced by memes

The news was removed last summer by the American tech giant Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.

Media researchers who have now examined the consequences are concerned. There is also the government of Canada, which has repeatedly lashed out at Meta.

Culture Minister Pascale St-Onge calls the news blockade an unfortunate and irresponsible decision. It has led to “disinformation and misinformation spreading” on Facebook in situations where people have a great need for information, the minister told the Reuters news agency.

She refers, among other things, to crisis situations, such as forest fires, and the periods leading up to local elections.

– Profit before safety

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made similar criticism last August, when Canada was hit by the largest wildfires ever observed in the country. In total, an area larger than Greece was scorched during 2023.

– In this crisis situation, when updated information is more important than ever, Facebook puts profit above people’s safety, Trudeau claimed.

The reason why Meta removed the news from its platforms in Canada is that Trudeau’s government tried to pressure the company to join and fund Canadian journalism.

A new law was passed that requires social media and search engines that link to news items to compensate the media that produce the items.

Meta did not want to pay and instead chose to remove news from Facebook and Instagram in Canada.

– Continued access

As authorities rage, Meta points out that Canadians still have access to reliable information from a variety of sources on Facebook. Public agencies, emergency services and organizations can still use the platform.

Furthermore, Meta believes that the news is not important for the company’s earnings. People use Facebook and Instagram even if the news is gone, a spokesperson for the company told Reuters.

At the same time, media researchers have investigated the consequences of the platforms having been without news for over six months.

The findings are described as disturbing. While news stories could previously get several million views on Facebook in Canada, now opinions and unverified content are all over the place.

– The news that is talked about in political groups is being replaced by memes, says Taylor Owen, who heads a center for the study of media, technology and democracy at McGill University.

Increasing activity

The Internet memes Owen is referring to can, for example, be a comical image of a political opponent with an irritating text.

One of those who produces such memes is the right-wing activist Jeff Ballingall. He tells of increasing activity on his Facebook page after Meta removed the news.

– We reach out to more and more people every day, says Ballingall to Reuters.

Going forward, Ballingall believes that the media will only become more tribal and niche-oriented. The fact that Meta has removed news fuels this development, he believes.

A survey carried out by the company NewsGuard for Reuters shows increasing sharing of sources that are not considered credible. These sources also get more “likes” and comments.

– This is particularly worrying, says NewsGuard CEO Gordon Crovitz.

Enemy states

The change of Facebook in Canada has happened at the same time as there have suddenly been many more websites with fake news created with artificial intelligence (AI). Some of the fake content is produced by hostile states that want to influence elections, according to Crovitz.

Although Meta has generally toned down political content, Facebook remains a popular source of information on community affairs. In Canada, 80 percent of the population is on Facebook, and over half of users accessed news on the platform in 2023.

Like Canada, Australia has also tried to get digital platforms to participate and finance journalism. In response, Facebook suspended access to news in Australia for a short period in 2021, just before a media funding law was passed.

The search giant Google, for its part, has agreed to participate and finance news production in Canada. Google strongly opposed the law passed in 2021 in Australia, but has not announced any change to its approach to Australian news media.

(© NTB)