Free Republic

Facebook has removed a popular, rapidly growing group where members would post stories about alleged negative COVID-19 vaccine side effects. The group, “COVID19 VACCINE VICTIMS AND FAMILIES,” had over 120,000 followers when it was shut down and had been gaining more than 10,000 followers per week. The shutdown of the page follows Facebook introducing a ban on a wide range of claims about the coronavirus vaccine in February. The list of prohibited claims includes claims that the vaccines cause blood clots and claims that the coronavirus vaccine change people’s DNA (something that even Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg told Facebook staff...

Facebook, which routinely adds its editorial comments to posts with which it disagrees, recently "fact-checked" a woman's complaint about her reaction to a coronavirus vaccine. Desiree Penrod, 25, said on Facebook after getting vaccinated in early March: "The vaccine is killing me today. My arm hurts, beyond exhausted, headache, stomach cramps and earaches." Penrod also posted: "Multiple people told me that I looked pale today. Yesterday, I was fine but today it's taking its toll on me." Facebook, citing the World Health Organization, added a disclaimer to a post by Penrose, "COVID-19 vaccines go through many tests for safety and...

Facebook is embarking on a major overhaul of its algorithms that detect hate speech, according to internal documents, reversing years of so-called “race-blind” practices. Those practices resulted in the company being more vigilant about removing slurs lobbed against White users while flagging and deleting innocuous posts by people of color on the platform. The overhaul, which is known as the WoW Project and is in its early stages, involves re-engineering Facebook’s automated moderation systems to get better at detecting and automatically deleting hateful language that is considered “the worst of the worst,” according to internal documents describing the project obtained...