WASHINGTON, DC ā An internet watchdog is warning the number of fake political news stories will surge as we head into the final stretch of the 2020 election.
Avaaz, a global advocacy group, released a study Tuesday that outlined the 100 most-viral fake political Facebook stories this year. Those stories were posted more than 2.3. million times, bringing in 158.9 million views.
Over half of the views have come in the past three months.
"Every American who cares about free and fair elections in 2020, including the candidates and political parties, should be sounding the alarm about Facebookās fake news problem," Avaaz's campaign director Fadi Quran said in the report.Ā Ā
In a statement, Facebook said it has made progress in limiting the reach of fake information.
"Multiple independent studies have found that we've cut the amount of fake news on Facebook by more than half since the 2016 election," the company said. "That still means plenty of people see fake news, which is why we now have more visible warning labels flagging this type of content, and prominent notifications when someone tries to share it or already has."
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