Facebook to verify the identities of some user profiles behind viral posts
Last updated on: 18 June,2020 01:50 pm
Facebook to verify the identities of some user profiles behind viral posts
(Web Desk) - Lost in the news of the George Floyd protests against police brutality and racism in the U.S., Facebook last week quietly noted it will now require Facebook profile pages with large followings in the U.S. to verify their identity. The company said that profiles with sizable audiences that also have a pattern of inauthentic behavior and whose posts rapidly go viral will be asked to verify their identity or the distribution of their posts will be impacted.
If the profile’s owner chooses not to verify their identity or the ID provided does not match the linked Facebook account, the distribution of the profile’s viral post will continue to be reduced so fewer people will see it, the company explains.
In addition, if the profile that’s posting is also a Facebook Page admin, they’ll need to complete the Page Publishing Authorization and won’t be able to post from their Page until the account is verified through Facebook’s systems.
The company said the move to verify profiles is about transparency.
"We want people to feel confident that they understand who’s behind the content they’re seeing on Facebook and this is particularly important when it comes to content that’s reaching a lot of people," Facebook said in a Thursday announcement.
Identify verification is not new to Facebook, but the company’s use of the process has increased in recent months, following the revelation that Russia-backed content reached as many as 126 million Americans on Facebook’s platform during and after the 2016 presidential election.
To address the issue, Facebook in August 2018 rolled out a new process that involved having Facebook Page managers secure their accounts and verify their locations. In December 2018, the resulting "People Who Manage This Page" section had rolled out to all Facebook Pages with a large audience. Also in 2018, Facebook began demanding ID verification for political "issue" ad buyers on debated topics of national legislative importance.