Social Media companies, such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube, enable users to share ideas effortlessly. According to Gomez (2014), social media represents a worldwide forum where people positively and negatively practice freedom of expression. Therefore, some users take advantage of and spread false or misleading information using catchy headlines. As private businesses, these companies can regulate content and thus select the content that users should publish. However, “Identifying violent expression, outside of extremes, is a grey area that cannot be governed by a steadfast rule” (Gomez, 2014). So, social media companies can't take full responsibility to control the spread of false information.
False Information Spread
In recent times, most people express themselves using social media since it allows them to virtually practice their freedom of speech. Like every freedom, there are rights that people should acknowledge and respect. Faria believes that “Our freedom of speech should not hamper another person’s rights to have their freedom of speech” (2016). So, when some users post false information on Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube, they affect how the world views the victims because people focus more on false information than the truth. False or misleading information incites violence and breeds conflict between groups and communities. Consequently, victims would recommend private social media sites to be responsible for controlling any information posted on their respective websites. As much as people with ill intentions have rights, they should respect others' rights and not damage people's reputation. This fact could mean that social media companies should restrict or remove harmful free speech and, if extreme, take action against perpetrators.
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Censorship of social media content is difficult, making it harder for social media companies to act quickly before damage spreads. People that create false news have selfish interests since they use catchy headlines to attract readers. In Dutton's perspective, "…facts are often manufactured to fit the argument, so fact-checking is often an aspect of identifying fake news” (2016). When perpetrators make up facts, fake news spread quickly because it is more interesting than reality. If private social media organizations took responsibility for such false information in their platforms, they would experience difficulties in identifying the facts. So there would arise problems with confronting false information issues.
Therefore, mitigating fake news would need censorship by a regulatory model, which goes against sharing, the primary goal of social media. It would force social media platforms to undermine all news and the news production and democratic consumption processes as they censor stories. So, it is impossible to regulate social media the same way that broadcast regulators control newscasters. Generally, making social media companies liable for false stories does not make sense considering that they are not edited newspapers. However, in Dutton’s (2016) opinion, social media can be responsible for misleading information if a regulatory model is built to screen and authenticate news. If created, this body should not focus on centralized censorship and social media regulation as newspapers or other traditional media.
Conclusion
Social media organizations such as Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook only provide an online space for people to express their views, but cannot guarantee their effects. So, when individual users spread false information through these platforms, for whatever reasons, the respective organizations are not responsible. Unfortunately, misleading information causes chaos among affected parties, and the majority would like these firms to be accountable like newspapers would. However, the blame falls on social media users as well. So, if social media corporations must take responsibility to control the fake content spread, they need help from a regulatory model, which would use the appropriate tools to evaluate information keenly.
