Contrary to speculations and claims by several African government officials that social media, especially Facebook is the centre for fake news, Facebook Anglophone West African representative, Mrs Adaora Ikenze, has voided the claims, saying the continent has the lowest rate of reporting false information posted on Facebook globally.
Business Hilights Ghana Bureau chief reports that in her presentation weekend in Ghana at a panel discussion on elections and cybersecurity to round-up the week-long celebration of National Cyber Security Awareness Month-2019 in Accra, the Nigerian Facebook chief averred that though Facebook is aware that some posts and information may be false, especially images and videos, users hardly report to Facebook and other relevant quarters, instead they still forward same to others.
Explaining more at the five-day programme organised by the Ghanaian Ministry of Communications, which has school children, heads of departments, internet service providers, among others in attendance, she urged users of social media to report such cases for them to be down-graded or removed for further investigations.
Mrs. Adaora Ikenze regretted that many of the false information are used to defame the hard won reputation of others; or cause fear and panic among the populace, noting that “Reporting to Facebook was anonymous and there is no need for informants to panic as their identity would be protected as there are systems in place to block false information.”
She further solicited for strategic intensive social media and digital literacy efforts across Africa even as she asked users to have a sense of responsibility and observe simple measures to protect their account and identity in the use of Facebook.
