Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an interview airing Thursday he doesn’t think his company should be the “arbiter of truth” of what’s said online after Twitter attached fact-checking links to a few of President Trump’s posts for the first time this week.
“We have a different policy I think than Twitter on this,” Mr. Zuckerberg told Fox News. “You know, I just believe strongly that Facebook shouldn’t be the arbiter of truth of everything that people say online.”
“I think, in general, private companies probably shouldn’t be, or especially these platform companies, shouldn’t be in the position of doing that,” he said.
Mr. Trump is set to sign an executive order dealing with social media after he and other Republicans roundly criticized Twitter for the move.
Mr. Zuckerberg said additional regulations aren’t necessarily the answer.
“I’d have to understand what they actually would intend to do,” he said. “But in general, I think a government choosing to censor a platform because they’re worried about censorship doesn’t exactly strike me as the right reflex there.”
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said on Wednesday their new policy doesn’t make the company an “arbiter of truth.”
“Our intention is to connect the dots of conflicting statements and show the information in dispute so people can judge for themselves,” he said. “More transparency from us is critical so folks can clearly see the why behind our actions.”
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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