Fake news: Facebook to face tougher rules in UK
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the committee therefore recommended that the british government increase the power of the information commissioners office to regulate social media sites update electoral laws to reflect modern campaign techniques and increase the transparency of political advertising on social media1 two days after its chief executive officer ceo lost over 16 billion a uk parliamentary committee has recommended an increased government oversight of facebook and other social media campaign platforms to protect democracy in the digital age1 an interim report by the house of commons media committee to be released on sunday said democracy is facing a crisis because the combination of data analysis and social media allows campaigns to target voters with messages of hate without their consent1 tech giants like facebook which operate in a largely unregulated environment are complicit because they havent done enough to protect personal information and remove harmful content1 the light of transparency must be allowed to shine on their operations and they must be made responsible and liable for the way in which harmful and misleading content is shared on their sites committee chairman damian collins said in a statement1 the study was due to be published sunday but a copy was leaked on friday by dominic cummings the director of the official campaign group backing britains departure from the european union1 social media companies are under scrutiny worldwide following allegations that political consultant cambridge analytica used data from tens of millions of facebook accounts to profile voters and help u.s. president donald trumps 2016 election campaign1 the committee is also investigating the impact of fake news distributed via social media sites1 collins also ripped facebook for allowing russian agencies to use its platform to spread disinformation and influence elections1 i believe what we have discovered so far is the tip of the iceberg more work needs to be done to expose how fake accounts target people during elections1 the ever-increasing sophistication of these campaigns which will soon be helped by developments in augmented reality technology makes this an urgent necessity he said1 the call was made following scathing report on fake news data misuse and interference by russia in the 2016 u.s. presidential election and other similar cases1 prime minister theresa may has pledged to address the issue in a so-called white paper to be released in the fall1 she signaled her unease last year accusing russia of meddling in elections and planting fake news to sow discord in the west1 the committee began its work in january 2017 interviewing 61 witnesses during 20 hearings that took on an investigatory tone not normally found in such forums in the house of commons1 the report criticised facebook chief mark zuckerberg for failing to appear before the panel and said his stand-ins were unwilling or unable to give full answers to the committees questions1 one of the committees recommendations is that the era of light-touch regulation for social media must come to an end1 social media companies can no longer avoid oversight by describing themselves as platforms because they use technology to filter and shape the information users see nor are they publishers since that model traditionally commissions and pays for content1 we recommend that a new category of tech company is formulated which tightens tech companies liabilities and which is not necessarily either a platform or a publisher1 we anticipate that the government will put forward these proposals in its white paper later this year the report said1 the committee also said that the information commissioners office needs more money so it can hire technical experts to be the sheriff in the wild west of the internet1 the funds would come from a levy on the tech companies much in the same way as the banks pay for the upkeep of the financial conduct authority1 our democracy is at risk and now is the time to act to protect our shared values and the integrity of our democratic institutions the committee said1