Meta boasts ties with Philippine fact-checkers

While it had already moved to discontinue the program, Meta boasted its third-party fact-checking initiative as a critical defense against disinformation in the Philippines.

- Dominique Nicole Flores

During its fourth hearing on Tuesday, April 8, the House Tri-Committee finally questioned representatives of social media giant Meta on what steps the company is taking to rein in the spread of falsehoods across its platforms like Facebook.

Rafael Frankel, Meta's director of public policy in Southeast Asia, presented the company's three-pronged approach to combating misinformation, stressing its partnership with fact-checking organizations in the country as a key component.

According to Frankel, the approach involves three main strategies:

• Removing content and accounts that violate our community standards, including harmful misinformation

• Reducing distribution of low-quality content, including fact-checked content

• Informing people by giving them more context so they can decide what to read, trust and share

"Meta works with fact-checking organizations in more than 60 languages globally to identify, review and rate viral misinformation on our platforms," he said.