Facebook will try to reduce both anti-vaccine content on Facebook and Instagram.
According today's Facebook announcement, the company will run a new action plan to combat misinformation around vaccinations. The beginning will be made by downgrading the ranking (rank) of groups and pages that spread false information about vaccines so they appear less in the Facebook News Feed. And on Instagram respectively, the company will prevent anti-vaccination content from appearing on Instagram Explore and hashtag pages.
Facebook's intended crackdown is to make these pages harder to find. Vaccinators will be excluded from recommendations and will not appear as recommended when typing in line search on Facebook. Ads that contain misinformation about vaccinations will be rejected.
According to Facebok, this campaign will build on the experience of the World Health Organization and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to help identify which pages spread the truth and which disseminate fantasies about vaccines. These organizations have identified pages of jokes and common misconceptions about vaccines.
Facebook is the latest social network that has not taken action on vaccinations. Last month, Pinterest took steps to block related content from appearing on Results search, and YouTube began blocking anti-vaccine advertising channels.