Fake news and misinformation have become two of the biggest issues plaguing popular social media sites. With companies like Facebook, Twitter and Google coming under the scanner in recent months, multimedia messaging app Snapchat’s CEO Evan Spiegel on Monday said that his company is fact-checking all political advertising. In an interview with CNBC, Spiegel said that his company subjects "all advertising to review, including political advertising."
Spiegel further said, that given the fact that they reach to so many young people, many of whom are first time voters, they are trying to create a place for political ads on their platform. According to him, the platforms are being created such so that youngsters can engage in political conversation, but they are trying to not allow misinformation to appear in advertising.
Comparing Snapchat's policy on political ads to cable television, Spiegel said it is more similar to cable than broadcast, the interview revealed. This is in sharp contrast to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, who has defended the social media app's decision to not fact-check political advertising, the CNBC report said, adding that Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, on his part, has decided to ban all sorts of politically inclined adverts. While Google has remained largely silent on the matter, but in an interaction with The Globe and Mail, they had said they will ban all political adverts in Canada ahead of the country's federal elections.
Comments
0 comment