Facebook Reportedly Allowed Powerful Users To Break Platform Rules

Facebook has exempted nearly 6 million of its most high-profile users from facing consequences for breaking platform rules through a systematic and secret tiering system that an internal review described as “a breach of trust,” internal documents obtained by the Wall Street Journal purport to show.

KEY FACTS

Facebook initially created the system known as “XCheck” or “cross-check” to help the platform moderate actions taken against the platform’s most popular users, like politicians and celebrities, according to the newspaper.

The system has allowed powerful users to break Facebook’s terms of service with few consequences, with some users deemed “whitelisted” being exempt from policy enforcement while other popular users’ posts are allowed to stay up pending further review, even if it breaks Facebook’s own rules.

Brazilian soccer player Neymar was protected from sanctions by the system in 2019 after posting nude photographs of a woman who had accused him of rape, a charge he denied, which were permitted to stay up for more than a day despite breaking platform rules about posting “nonconsensual intimate imagery,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

The documents show “whitelisted” users have also shared disinformation and conspiracy theories about vaccine safety, Hillary Clinton’s alleged role in a pedophile sex trafficking ring, and other outlandish claims that Facebook’s own fact-checkers deemed false.

A 2019 internal review of the system described Facebook’s practices as “a breach of trust” and “not publicly defensible,” according to documents marked attorney-client privileged and obtained by the Wall Street Journal.

According to the newspaper, Facebook has minimized the size of the system and the role it plays in moderation: the platform told its oversight board in June the XCheck system is utilized in “a small number of decisions.”

Facebook did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Forbes.

CRUCIAL QUOTE

“We are not actually doing what we say we do publicly,” a 2019 confidential review obtained by the Wall Street Journal read. “Unlike the rest of our community, these people can violate our standards without any consequences.”

BIG NUMBER

5.8 million. That’s how many users the XCheck system covered last year, according to the documents seen by the Wall Street Journal. Facebook has more than 3 billion users.

CONTRA

Facebook told the Wall Street Journal in a statement the system was launched to serve as “an additional step” to help moderate content that may “require more understanding.”

A rep said the platform is working to phase out “whitelisting” after identifying issues with the system, calling the internal documents obtained by the newspaper “outdated information stitched together to create a narrative.”

KEY BACKGROUND

Facebook has struggled with content moderation. Last year, the platform faced a boycott from more than 500 advertisers like Target, Ford, Adidas and Dunkin Donuts over what critics called lax moderation policies regarding hate speech, though experts say the financial hit Facebook took was most likely minimal.

CEO Mark Zuckerberg controversially railed against labeling newsworthy posts from high profile users that violated platform rules, saying it carried “a risk of leading us to editorialize on content we don’t like,” before changing his mind amid the boycott.

In June, Facebook announced it would ban former President Donald Trump from the platform for two years over encouraging his supporters to storm the U.S. Capitol in January.

WHAT TO WATCH FOR

The report detailing information about Facebook’s X Check system is the first in a series based on internal documents that will show the platform “knows, in acute detail, that its platforms are riddled with flaws that cause harm, often in ways only the company fully understands,” according to the Wall Street Journal.