Facebook today announced changes to make Groups a safer place and stop harmful content, like hate speech and misinformation.
In a new blog post explained Facebook said it will begin improving group recommendations while limiting the reach of groups and members that violate the rules.
While we work to ensure that potentially harmful groups are not recommended, we try to be careful not to penalize high-quality groups on similar topics. The tension we face is not between our business interests and removing low-quality groups - it's about taking action against potentially harmful groups while ensuring community leaders can grow their groups that follow the rules and provide value to people.
Facebook adopts approach from News Feed
Facebook recently removed civic and political groups, as well as newly created groups, from recommendations in the US. While it is possible to invite friends to these groups or search for them, these restrictions are now being expanded worldwide. The company says:
If a group starts violating our rules, we will now start showing them further down in the recommendations.
This is a similar approach to the News Feed, where Facebook shows lower quality posts further down. If a user tries to join a group that violates the Community Standards, Facebook will issue a warning. But it will still be possible to join the group.
Facebook: Admins and moderators are also involved
Admins and moderators must also temporarily approve all posts "if this group has a significant number of members who have violated guidelines or have been part of other groups that have been removed for rule violations." Facebook also warns that if users repeatedly violate the guidelines in groups, they will be blocked from posting and commenting in all groups for a certain period of time. These users will also not be able to create new groups. (Image: Facebook)
