Facebook blames bug for blocking coronavirus posts

Facebook has restored thousands of user posts about COVID-19 it says were wrongly blocked or removed due to a software glitch.

Fcebook users complained posts about coronavirus had been blocked or removed. Picture: AFP

Facebook erroneously blocked thousands of users from posting legitimate news articles and marked health information about the coronavirus pandemic as spam because of a “bug” in the company’s automatic content moderation system.

The issue was rectified on Wednesday after frustrated users reported on Twitter that the company’s automatic censors had gone “haywire” and were taking down or blocking articles from news outlets including BuzzFeed, The Atlantic, USA Today, and The Times of Israel.

In a rare public statement, Facebook’s vice president of integrity, Guy Rosen, acknowledged there had been a problem with the company’s automated software.

“We’ve restored all the posts that were incorrectly removed, which included posts on all topics - not just those related to COVID-19,” Mr Rosen said on Twitter.

“This was an issue with an automated system that removes links to abuse websites, but incorrectly removed a lot of other posts too.”

The social media giant’s anti-spam system helps detect potentially harmful content and then sends it to human reviewers for assessment.

Earlier, Mr Rosen denied the glitch was related to the company’s decision to send content moderators home due to concerns over the rapid spread of the coronavirus.

“We’re on this - this is a bug in an anti-spam system, unrelated to any changes in our content moderator workforce.”

On Monday, however, Facebook conceded a significant drop in human oversight could potentially compromise the company’s content moderation system.

“With fewer people available for human review we’ll continue to prioritise imminent harm and increase our reliance on proactive detection in other areas to remove violating content,” Facebook said in a statement on its corporate site.

“We don’t expect this to impact people using our platform in any noticeable way.”

It comes after Facebook on Tuesday joined the world’s foremost tech giants, including Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Reddit, Twitter and YouTube, in publishing a joint statement pledging to fight against coronavirus-related misinformation.

In January, the company came under sustained criticism after a series of conspiracy theories and false claims about coronavirus - including the peddling of fake cures - surfaced on its platform and were widely shared by users.

Youtube, meanwhile, has warned that the “unprecedented COVID-19 situation” will lead to a reduction in content after parent company Google also ordered hundreds of staff to work from home.

“With fewer people to review content, our automated systems will be stepping in to keep YouTube safe,” the company said in a statement.

“More videos will be removed than normal during this time, including content that does not violate our community guidelines.”

The company has also offered a pre-emptive apology to creators who “make a living on YouTube” amid fears a reduction in moderators will lead to a spike in acceptable content being removed and a subsequent loss of income for well-known YouTubers.