Facebook Inc. today announced a number of changes it’s making in an effort to crack down on the spread of disinformation on the platform.

Many of the problems on Facebook happen when people join certain Groups. Those Groups expand, and before you know it, thousands of people are talking about and sharing dangerous ideas. For the first time, Facebook will ban a Group if hate speech or disinformation circulates in that Group too often even if it hasn’t openly violated community standards rules.

“We’ve taken action to curb the spread of harmful content, like hate speech and misinformation, and made it harder for certain groups to operate or be discovered, whether they’re Public or Private,” said Facebook in a blog post. “When a group repeatedly breaks our rules, we take it down entirely.”

This is not new in the sense that Facebook already has rules for Groups that transgress in terms of its community standards, but the company is now talking about “quality” rather than outright transgressions. Facebook said it will now ensure that Groups it deems as “harmful” will not be recommended to people. Higher-quality Groups won’t be affected.

The Groups will remain on the platform and people can still join them or share them, but they will be hidden under Facebook’s algorithmic cloak. The company said this is no different from how it deals with certain news items in the News Feed.

Moreover, from now on, people about to join a Group will receive a warning if that Group has in the past been told off for breaking the rules regarding community standards. Facebook said it’s less likely people will join those groups anyway since they won’t be recommended.

Administrators and moderators of Groups will also have to work a lot harder from now on. Facebook said that if a Group has misbehaved once too often, those who control will be asked to review every single post before it appears on the platform. If too many posts are reviewed and passed as good, Facebook will just get rid of the Group. The problem, of course, is that banning opinions rather than outright fake news happens often.

Groups were toxic and was alarmed by their growth, according to internal documents reviewed by The Wall Street Journal.”https://t.co/HUFfV6R8Ds

— Dustin Volz (@dnvolz) March 17, 2021

If that sounds Orwellian, Facebook also said that any individuals who have violated the rules too often will be banned from commenting or joining any Groups at all. They won’t be able to invite people to Groups and they won’t be able to create new Groups. “These measures are intended to help slow down the reach of those looking to use our platform for harmful purposes and build on existing restrictions we’ve put in place over the last year,” said Facebook.

Photo: daveynin/Flickr