Facebook Tries to Block ‘Hoaxes’ From the News Feed

Facebook is now saying it will tip off users when an item in the news feed is a hoax. If enough people report a piece of content, a notification will be added to it saying “Many people on Facebook have reported that this story contains false information”.

Facebook didn’t say how many times an item will have to be flagged to trigger the warning. Facebook said it won’t remove the posts identified as false. But they’ll likely appear less often in users’ news feeds, in part because users might delete them or share them less frequently. The initiative is part of Facebook’s effort to make the news feed more useful so users spend more time and come back more often. Facebook calls this packing the feed with “high quality content.”