Tackling misinformation is core to our policies: Instagram policy head

With the largest base of fact checkers in India, tackling misinformation is core to the policies for all Meta platforms, said the head of policy of Instagram. 

In India 11 independent fact checkers work with Meta on content in 15 languages in India. 

“Our platforms have zero tolerance to Child Sexual Abuse, bullying and harassment, hate speech, voter interference, etc. Our partners are constantly telling us what is happening on the ground and also alerting us on various societal complexes. This is why our enforcement is never black and white, there's a lot of thought that goes into it. We consult with people all around the world while developing our policies,” said Natasha jog, Head of Policy, Instagram, India.

She also added that the community standards and fact-checking framework of Meta-owned platforms are ever-evolving for user safety, in consultation with its partners, civil society groups, academics and NGOs.

Meta is also partnering with the Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology (MeitY) for the G20 Stay Safe Online Campaign on February 7, International Safer Internet Day. The new program, titled #DigitalSuraksha, will include an awareness campaign along with video messages for tackling online fraud, reporting harmful content, and other online safety tips. Meta will continue to add more initiatives to the campaign over the year.

The company, which owns Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, has also launched an awareness campaign to prevent the sharing of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and encourage people to report such content. The campaign will educate users on the harm of sharing CSAM, and the impact it has on the victim and will encourage anyone who sees harmful videos and images of children to protect the victim by reporting it immediately to Facebook.

The social media company said it made significant investments in various age-appropriate measures and tools to ensure safety for youth, women, parents and children on its platforms.

Jog added, “The problem of misinformation is serious. We have started with six videos, we're going to build these into multiple languages. And this is going to be a steady drumbeat that you are seeing that you're going to be seeing from us from here on the #DigitalSuraksha umbrella.”

The company will also partner with Delhi Police for its campaign aimed at digital literacy about youth well-being, child safety, and misinformation.

Rising misinformation and fake news on social media have been a matter of concern in India for the past few years. The government last month released a new draft rule that mandates online platforms to remove content flagged as fake or false by government authorised agencies.

Meta will work with the Delhi Police on a 2-month long programme to provide digital literacy to 10,000 students across various schools and colleges in Delhi. Further, Meta and Delhi Police will jointly build resources to educate users about protecting themselves against online/ digital scams. As part of this partnership, Meta will also train Delhi police personnel on Meta’s various safety tools.

For consumer awareness, Meta has partnered with Delhi Metro and will wrap one train with educational content about safety tools available on Meta’s platforms. Commuters will be redirected to Meta’s safety tools through a QR code.