In a bid to reduce the spread of misinformation and false news on Facebook, the company has announced that it is rolling out a new notification screen feature that alerts users when they are about to share news articles that are more than 90 days old.
As well all know, the timeline of an article also determines the authenticity, and sharing an outdated news articles could confuse the current news atmosphere. With the new notification screen alert, users will get a warning if they’re about to share an outdated post (articles older than 90 days) but will still allow people to share if the article is still relevant to the current time.
Facebook acknowledged that old stories shared out of their original context play a role in spreading misinformation. The social media company said “news publishers in particular” have expressed concern about old stories being recirculated as though they’re breaking news.
“Over the past several months, our internal research found that the timeliness of an article is an important piece of context that helps people decide what to read, trust and share,” said Facebook.
Instagram also launched a similar pop-up notification last year to curb its users from sharing abusive comments with a similar set of options.
In a blog post announcing the new feature, Facebook said that it is now considering other kinds of notification screens to reduce misinformation, including pop-ups for posts about COVID-19 that would provide context about source links and steer users toward public health resources.
“Through providing more context, our goal is to make it easier for people to identify content that’s timely, reliable, and most valuable to them.”