Facebook employees have urged their company CEO Mark Zuckerberg to rethink his position on allowing politicians to "lie" in political advertising.
In an open letter to Zuckerberg obtained by The New York Times on Monday, more than 250 people said the policy, which exempts such ads from Facebook standards for third-party validation, threatens what the company represents.
Facebook said last month it would exempt politicians from the company's verification procedures, which include a third party verifying the authenticity of the published information and not violating the rules of publishing on the social networking platform, which may lead to the publication of content that would violate the guidelines of the platform, which prevents Facebook from Ordinary users.
"The misinformation affects all of us. Our current policies on verifying people in, or running for, political positions are a threat to Facebook. We strongly oppose this policy in its current state. It does not protect votes, but it allows politicians Instead, use our platform as a weapon by targeting people who believe the content published by political figures is trustworthy. "
This adds to the mistrust of the platform and "indicates that we are well served by deliberate disinformation campaigns by those in or seeking positions of force," they said.
Staff urged executives to limit the ability of politicians to target potential voters.
Currently, politicians can divide users based on how likely they are to be voted or affected by a potential message, tactics that have become notorious thanks to political consultancy Cambridges Analytica.
"These announcements are often so small that conversations on our platforms are more silent than on other platforms," the staff said. Facebook already enforces such restrictions on ads related to housing, education or credit, to stop potential discrimination.
Two weeks ago, Zuckerberg gave a speech at Georgetown University in which he tried to articulate his ideas on freedom of expression and his company's role in moderating political talks.
His right and left criticized his speech widely, as both directions believed that Zuckerberg was relinquishing his responsibility to help spread the wrong information. Now, his staff seem to agree.