The biggest social networks today issued a joint statement on the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. In short, they promise to fight misinformation circulating on their platforms.
Signatories include Facebook companies, GoogleLinkedin Microsoft, Reddit, Twitter and YouTube.
The joint statement came after a video conference last week involving White House executives and all of the companies.
During the teleconference, which reportedly lasted more than two hours, the White House called on US technology companies to help with the crisis and, among other things, to stop the spread of coronavirus conspiracy theories circulating online.
In a joint statement today, the seven largest social networks said they would work with each other and with government health services around the world to tackle misinformation related to COVID-19.
"We're helping millions of people get online while fighting it together scam and misinformation about the virus by enabling authoritative content on our platforms and sharing critical updates in coordination with government healthcare organizations around the world,” the companies said.
The joint statement does not describe how the companies will manage them scams and misinformation about COVID-19.
In fact, the major social networks will try to fight false advertisements with COVID-19 treatments, news articles from unknown sources or with misinformation, as well as videos that convey conspiracy theories about the origin of the disease.
Nevertheless, some of the social networks that signed the joint statement today tried to limit the fake content shared on their platforms even before today's announcement.
For example, Google has banned Android apps related to COVID-19, Facebook has removed misleading ads, and Twitter has prevented various conspiracy theories from circulating on its accounts.
However, these efforts are not enough, according to some critics, and much work is still needed.
For example, despite the fact that it was obvious and obviously false, that President Trump getting readyn for US lock down went viral on various social networks, leading many Americans to prepare unnecessarily and store various for a prolonged quarantine.
