Facebook launches a new update to limit low-quality webpages

Facebook has rolled out a new update would lower the prominence of fake news posts and malicious web links in the news feed of its users. It would help in cutting down financial funding to such websites

By: News Desk |
July 4, 2017 10:40 pm

Facebook has launched a massive crackdown on spammy websites that contain less of substantiative content and more of shocking and malicious advertisements. The social media giant said that it was rolling out updates that would lower the prominence of such deceptive web pages in the news feed of its community members and help reduce the incentives that these low-quality websites gain from Facebook ads.

“Starting today, we’re rolling out an update so people see fewer posts and ads in News Feed that link to these low-quality web page experiences. Similar to the work we’re already doing to stop misinformation, this update will help reduce financial the economic incentives of financially-motivated spammers,” Facebook wrote in a blog post.

How will this happen?
Facebook faced a lot of flak last year after its fake news problem went out of control during the US Presidential elections 2016. According to reports, fake news stories out-performed the legit news from prominent channels in terms of likes shares and comments. Since then, it has not only strengthened its algorithm to identify fake news but also hired third party fact-checkers for the same. It has also reviewed hundreds of thousands of web pages to identify websites with little substantive content and shocking ads. As a part of its efforts to tackle the menace, Facebook has trained its artificial intelligence (AI) to understand if the new web pages shared on its platform have similar characteristics.

“So if we determine a post might link to these types of low-quality web pages, it may show up lower in people’s feeds and may not be eligible to be an ad,” Facebook added in its blog.

ALSO READ: Facebook to hire 3,000 workers to check and remove inappropriate content

How will it affect my news feed?
For starters, you will see more organic posts on the top of your news feed while the low-quality web pages will be pushed towards the bottom. Also, the publisher with low-quality content will witness a decline in their traffic numbers.

Happy Facebook-ing folks!