Brisbane (Australia) (AFP)

The blocking Thursday by Facebook of many news content in Australia could lead to a proliferation in the country of false information circulating on this social network, the American giant not having cut off access to the pages at the origin of conspiracy theories and misinformation.

When they woke up Thursday, Australians were unable to post links to news articles or check local or international media Facebook pages.

At the same time, people living abroad no longer had access to Australian information.

The American giant thus wanted to respond to a bill that aims to force Facebook and Google to pay the media for the resumption of their content.

Facebook's retaliation measure has touched millions of Australians, sparking their anger.

Official pages of the emergency services used to alert the population in the event of forest fires, floods or epidemics have been inadvertently affected.

Facebook then activated to restore them.

The pages of associations fighting against cancer or helping the homeless appeared empty, as did those of large companies.

On the other hand, several Facebook pages at the origin of conspiracy theories and disinformation were not affected by this blockage.

Among them, several pages have been identified by AFP's fact-checking team as sharing false claims with tens of thousands of users.

The Media, Entertainment and the Arts Alliance said professional journalists were a bulwark against the spread of false information until their work was banned from Facebook.

"By limiting independent and professionally produced news in Australia, Facebook allows the promotion of conspiracy theories, followers of QAnon (a conspiracy movement), disinformation and fake news on its platform," said Marcus Strom, the chairman. of this Alliance.

In his eyes, "this irresponsible decision by Facebook will encourage the dissemination of false information, which is particularly dangerous during a pandemic and constitutes a betrayal for Australian readers".

- "Think carefully" -

A Facebook spokesperson for his part said that "his company's commitment to combating disinformation has not changed."

"We direct people to authoritative health information and notify them of updates through our Covid-19 information center," said the American giant, which has hired some 60 digital verification organizations including AFP to across the planet.

The Facebook blockade came days before the start of Australia's vaccination campaign, sparking fears that messages from health officials could be drowned out amid those from opponents of vaccination.

“I'll say it again to Facebook, think carefully. You might be (there) for the money, but we are all there for safety, protection and accountability,” Australia's Health Minister Greg said. Hunt.

"Now is the time to go back to where you were supposed to be, as a company, about community, engagement, not money."

Facebook claimed to generate hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for Australian media through user clicks.

Voices have been raised against the speed and scale of Facebook's action in Australia, denouncing the platform's reluctance to end violence, hate speech and disinformation.

In January, Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said he was trying to "bring down the temperature" by limiting the provocative political debates long welcomed.

The social network has also undertaken to ban groups sharing false information about Covid-19 and to put forward the advice of official and reliable bodies.

But for the NGO Reset Australia, in favor of digital democracy, the blocking of Australian news has revealed "how little the platform cares about putting an end to disinformation".

Facebook's reaction contrasts with that of Google, which on Wednesday agreed to pay "significant sums" in return for content from the News Corp. news group.

by Rupert Murdoch.

© 2021 AFP