If You Have to Ask “Should Deep Fakes That Make the President Look Like a Pedophile Be Allowed on Facebook?” You’ve Already Lost

Irrelevant Oversight Board’s New Case Shows Imminent Risks of Meta and AI

12 October 2023 — Statement for Attribution from the Real Facebook Oversight Board:

Meta’s Oversight Board this week asked for public input on a new case, a user appeal of Meta’s refusal to remove a digitally altered video of President Biden on Facebook, which has been widely circulated and used to claim President Biden is “a sick pedophile.” The case shows both the failure of the Oversight Board model and the imminent risks AI and digitally altered content pose to the 2024 election.

Should Meta remove a digitally altered fake video that’s being used to claim President Biden is “a sick pedophile?” Of course they should.

Is that a question that should even need to be referred to an Oversight Board of 20+ highly paid experts and public intellectuals? Of course not. If You Have to Ask “Should Deep Fakes That Make the President Look Like a Pedophile Be Allowed on Facebook?” You’ve Already Lost. The Oversight Board, which has no enforcement power and issues only recommendations to Meta, over half of which are never implemented, has descended into parody, moderating blindingly obvious cases with an outcome they are powerless to enforce.

More concerning, though, is that Meta is already failing to limit the use of AI and digitally altered content in ways that imperil the 2024 election. While experts and policymakers debate the “long term” implications of AI, digitally altered content is distorting the 2024 election now, in real time. If a video faked to make President Biden look like a pedophile isn’t off limits, its game on for disinformers and bad actors.

Our input to Meta’s Oversight Board: resign and speak out, for your own dignity and for the benefit of all Meta’s users. And we urge policymakers to address disinformation from AI and digitally altered content now, for 2024, with real, independent oversight and regulation.

Real Facebook Oversight Board members are available for interviews. Statements do not reflect the individual positions of all Real Facebook Oversight Board Members. Contact us at media@the-citizens.com.