House Subcommittee Postpones Social Media Hearing
The House Oversight Subcommittee postponed Tuesday’s hearing on social media data practices. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign professor Kevin Leicht, New York University Cybersecurity's Laura Edelson and Northeastern University professor Alan Mislove were listed as witnesses. Facebook’s labeling of COVID-19 misinformation…
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“has been somewhat effective” at curbing the sharing of suspect posts, Leicht says in prepared testimony. But because of algorithms and the way Facebook limits access to researchers, they can’t say whether the reduction is due to algorithmic decisions or changes in user behavior, he says. He notes Twitter does “relatively little labeling,” which seems contrary to the company’s stated practices. He suggests researchers, who meet strict confidentiality protocols, should have access to social media data.