Meta’s Oversight Board Is Right to Recommend a Disinformation Inquiry, But It Has No Power to Make It Happen.

A real oversight body wouldn’t politely ask the company it was overseeing for an investigation — it would demand one.

20 April — Meta’s Oversight Board today made an important recommendation, urging to “commission an impact assessment with a focus on how design features like Facebook’s News Feed recommendation algorithms can amplify dangerous health-related misinformation.”

But respectfully, nothing the Oversight Board recommends should be taken seriously, or reported as news short of their own resignations.

Two years on, the Oversight Board’s one consequential decision, the “Trump Ban” has already been reversed — Trump is back on the platform. And according to their own statistics, Meta has only fully implemented a third of their recommendations.

A real oversight body wouldn’t politely ask the company it was overseeing for an investigation — it would demand one. That’s real oversight. The Oversight Board begs for scraps but is still hand picked and paid for by Meta, who has no obligation to do anything they ask.

Should Meta’s algorithms be investigated? Absolutely. Does the Oversight Board’s recommendation have any consequence? Absolutely not. While it’s encouraging to see them scale up their demands, that’s not oversight — it’s PR.

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.