| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 傳播學院傳播碩士學位學程 === 107 === After the 2016 United States presidential election, the issue of “fake news” has been brought to public attention. The widespread of fake news has been affecting the world. Social media is criticized for providing platforms for the spread of fake news, and its algorithm has worsened the situation. Therefore, social media has to face the issue of fake news on its platform.
This study focuses on the self-regulation of Facebook, the largest social media in the world. Through document analysis, this study examines the phenomena and impact of fake news, the self-regulation that Facebook adopts to prevent fake news, and the regulation and governance in different countries when Facebook’s self-regulation doesn't work. In-depth interviews are conducted to explore how Taiwanese government officials, non-governmental organizations, and scholars consider the effect of Facebook’s self-regulation and the actions that Taiwanese government take to respond to fake news. This study provides suggestions to Facebook and Taiwanese government as for how to respond to the issue.
This study finds that Facebook adopts many methods to respond to the problem of fake news. However, compared to the self-regulation that Facebook adopts in other countries, the self-regulation adopted in Taiwan is said to be preliminary, insufficient, and doesn't meet the expectation of Taiwanese society. In addition, although the Taiwanese government does not tend to deal with the problem of fake news through direct legislation, what it has been doing to respond to fake news has not been very effective. Therefore, it is necessary for the government to be more active in responding to the challenges of fake news. Based on the above findings, this study suggests that Facebook should: (1) increase resources in Taiwan and recruit more local staffs, (2) apply the research result of Credibility of Internet media to the algorithm, (3) provide related data for the public to examine the result of fighting against fake news on the platform. And as for the government, this study suggests the following: (1) hold social media accountable for self-regulation, (2) no need to exclude the possibility of legislation to prevent fake news, (3) hold content farms accountable, (4) reinforce verification requirements of traditional media, (5) conduct projects that need huge resources and long-term investment.
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