As the war between Russia and Ukraine wages on, many companies have taken a firm stance, usually in the favor of Ukraine. Notable names include Microsoft, Dell, Logitech, Ericsson, and more. On the other hand, many are accusing Meta of allowing pro-Russia propaganda on its platform while censoring Ukrainian viewpoints. Today, Meta has issued a statement to deny these claims.
Meta has emphasized that it has diverse dedicated teams that monitor multi-regional content across its social media platforms in accordance with the guidelines defined for Facebook and Instagram. This involves locals for better context of the content being posted. Meta claims that Ukrainian content requiring "language and cultural expertise" is handled solely by Ukrainian reviewers, not Russian. This alone should be enough to counter claims of bias against Ukraine.
Even apart from this, Meta says that its content guidelines have been standardized to the point that reviewers should reach the same decision about a particular piece of content regardless of its country of origin.
When it comes to the reviewers themselves, Meta says that personnel go through a strict onboarding process and multiple re-trainings to ensure that they meet the company"s standards of content moderation. Weekly audits through random sampling of the content are also conducted and they have always shown "consistently high levels of accuracy" across multiple languages.
That said, Meta has noted that the system obviously isn"t perfect, just like humans and technology. As such, inappropriate content may slip through the cracks sometimes but this is why it has separate teams to rectify errors and make it easier for social media users to appeal certain decisions. Meta has emphasized that claims of bias in its content moderation mechanism are simply wrong and are just a way to undermine trust in the platform during times of war.