Facebook Inc will begin to prioritize “trustworthy” news outlets on its stream of social media posts as it works to combat “sensationalism” and “misinformation,” Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said on Friday.
The company, which has more than 2 billion monthly users, said it will use surveys to determine rankings on how trustworthy news outlets are. It also said it would put an emphasis on local news sources.
The move is likely to send shockwaves through the media landscape in nearly every country, given the ubiquity of the world’s largest social network and how central it has become in some places to the distribution of news.
Zuckerberg outlined the shakeup in a post on Facebook, saying that starting next week the News Feed, the company’s centerpiece product, would prioritize “high quality news” over less trusted sources.
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