As we inch closer to the upcoming US Elections, the debate revolving around social media and its censorship rules continues.
Tech giants Google and Facebook have been accused by the Republican party and former US President Donald Trump of censoring all data related to him and his ongoing campaign. However, the leading organizations are fighting back against those claims.
The charges regarding censorship arose when a group of users saw Google’s search engine failing to function through an autocomplete feature when asked about Trump. This led many to believe that it was a deliberate decision taken by the search giant.
This made tech billionaire Elon Musk jump into the picture and have his say on the matter with a tweet related to just that. He added more fuel to the fire by expressing his dismay and shock as to how Google was banning searches related to him and that it was indeed an interference in the ongoing election campaign.
As a prompt response, Google denied the allegations and provided a justification as to why they felt it was not working. Firstly, Google says it’s an automatic safeguard in place that stops autocompletion from popping up on topics that could give rise to political instability. After all, who can forget the horror massacre and violence that arose at one of Trump’s last rallies in Pennsylvania where he was nearly assassinated.
Google mentioned through its own tweet how the predicted questions should have popped up but they did not. But in their defense, as soon as it was brought to their attention, the company began working on the issues and it’s working again.
Secondly, the search giant shared the blame game on a software bug that it says spans the whole political spectrum. It impacts searches related to former American presidents such as Barack Obama. Even if you add in a query stating Vice President K, no predictions pop up. And again, they’re working on that glitch too.
Google says the systems are working great the majority of the time. However, you can always find predictions that are not expected during the start, or some imperfections may arise with time such as bugs.
On the other hand, Facebook’s parent firm Meta was also accused of the same. It was called out for blocking content linked to Trump and some even went as far as to allege how the Meta AI chatbot stopped generating replies to queries related to Trump’s possible assassination attempt.
Meanwhile, others spoke about how Facebook barred them from sharing images of Trump after the whole assassination attempt arose and he displayed signs of strength such as his fist in the air.
They reiterated how nothing done in this scenario had to do with bias while expressing dismay at how the situation arose and why people were made to feel a certain way after this took place.
One report speaks about how Meta was forced to chime in when some users altered images from the Trump shooting to make it appear like Secret Service Agents were smiling after Trump was covered in blood on the ground.
Hence, their systems wrongly applied fact checks to the real image as well and that led to this outcome, which Meta says was swiftly rectified after being brought to their attention.
Meanwhile, Meta says it prevented its chatbot from rolling out replies to Trump’s shooting because it felt it was better for the chatbot to give no answers than provide any inaccurate ones that would lead to further political instability.
Hence, chatbots were simply programmed to reply with statements related to how they couldn’t provide any data on this front. But both these sides of the story don’t seem too convincing for both Trump and his party.
They feel it's all being done deliberately to have the campaign censored. Meanwhile, another post published on Truth Socal shared Trump speaking about Facebook admitting it was at fault for wrongly censoring his political campaign and therefore was caught red-handed in the act.
He mentioned the same thing for Google. And if that was not enough, he has invited his supporters to go after both these tech giants because they’re causing a major backlash in terms of censorship. Now what more can you expect from Trump, right? He’s already threatened to throw Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in jail in the past so nothing new here.
Read next: YouTube Makes New Changes To Suspension Appeals While Simplifying Navigation To Creator Channel Pages
Tech giants Google and Facebook have been accused by the Republican party and former US President Donald Trump of censoring all data related to him and his ongoing campaign. However, the leading organizations are fighting back against those claims.
The charges regarding censorship arose when a group of users saw Google’s search engine failing to function through an autocomplete feature when asked about Trump. This led many to believe that it was a deliberate decision taken by the search giant.
This made tech billionaire Elon Musk jump into the picture and have his say on the matter with a tweet related to just that. He added more fuel to the fire by expressing his dismay and shock as to how Google was banning searches related to him and that it was indeed an interference in the ongoing election campaign.
As a prompt response, Google denied the allegations and provided a justification as to why they felt it was not working. Firstly, Google says it’s an automatic safeguard in place that stops autocompletion from popping up on topics that could give rise to political instability. After all, who can forget the horror massacre and violence that arose at one of Trump’s last rallies in Pennsylvania where he was nearly assassinated.
Google mentioned through its own tweet how the predicted questions should have popped up but they did not. But in their defense, as soon as it was brought to their attention, the company began working on the issues and it’s working again.
Secondly, the search giant shared the blame game on a software bug that it says spans the whole political spectrum. It impacts searches related to former American presidents such as Barack Obama. Even if you add in a query stating Vice President K, no predictions pop up. And again, they’re working on that glitch too.
Google says the systems are working great the majority of the time. However, you can always find predictions that are not expected during the start, or some imperfections may arise with time such as bugs.
On the other hand, Facebook’s parent firm Meta was also accused of the same. It was called out for blocking content linked to Trump and some even went as far as to allege how the Meta AI chatbot stopped generating replies to queries related to Trump’s possible assassination attempt.
Meanwhile, others spoke about how Facebook barred them from sharing images of Trump after the whole assassination attempt arose and he displayed signs of strength such as his fist in the air.
- Also read: Meta Reaches Massive $1.4 Billion Settlement With Texas Over Facebook’s Tag Suggestions For Photos
They reiterated how nothing done in this scenario had to do with bias while expressing dismay at how the situation arose and why people were made to feel a certain way after this took place.
One report speaks about how Meta was forced to chime in when some users altered images from the Trump shooting to make it appear like Secret Service Agents were smiling after Trump was covered in blood on the ground.
Hence, their systems wrongly applied fact checks to the real image as well and that led to this outcome, which Meta says was swiftly rectified after being brought to their attention.
Meanwhile, Meta says it prevented its chatbot from rolling out replies to Trump’s shooting because it felt it was better for the chatbot to give no answers than provide any inaccurate ones that would lead to further political instability.
Hence, chatbots were simply programmed to reply with statements related to how they couldn’t provide any data on this front. But both these sides of the story don’t seem too convincing for both Trump and his party.
They feel it's all being done deliberately to have the campaign censored. Meanwhile, another post published on Truth Socal shared Trump speaking about Facebook admitting it was at fault for wrongly censoring his political campaign and therefore was caught red-handed in the act.
He mentioned the same thing for Google. And if that was not enough, he has invited his supporters to go after both these tech giants because they’re causing a major backlash in terms of censorship. Now what more can you expect from Trump, right? He’s already threatened to throw Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg in jail in the past so nothing new here.
Read next: YouTube Makes New Changes To Suspension Appeals While Simplifying Navigation To Creator Channel Pages
