Facebook Adds 10 African Languages To Its 3rd-Party Fact-Checking Program

Facebook is partnering with Africa Check and will now include 10 African languages. The Third-Party-Fact-Checking program helps to assess the accuracy of news on Facebook and seeks to reduce the spread of misinformation/fake news.

Africa Check is an independent fact-checking organisation that was launched in 2018 and they are collaborating to add the following languages to Facebook’s 3rd-Party program:

Yoruba and Igbo, adding to Hausa which was already supported in Nigeria
Swahili in Kenya
Wolof in Senegal
Afrikaans, Zulu, Setswana, Sotho, Northern Sotho and Southern Ndebele in South Africa

We continue to make significant investments in our efforts to fight the spread of false news on our platform, whilst building supportive, safe, informed and inclusive communities. Our third-party fact-checking programme is just one of many ways we are doing this, and with the expansion of local language coverage, this will help in further improving the quality of information people see on Facebook. We know there is still more to do, and we’re committed to this.
Kojo Boakye – Facebook Head of Public Policy, Africa

According to the press release sent to media outlets, local articles will be fact-checked alongside the verification of images and videos. If any of Facebook’s partners in the program identifies a story as false, that story will appear lower in your News Feed, “significantly reducing its distribution.”

Last year, we recommended our readers to check out Africa Check, calling it a vital platform debunking myths being reported by publications with large followings. This partnership with Facebook is great news and congratulations to both Africa Check and Facebook for coming together.

We’re thrilled to be expanding the arsenal of the languages we cover in our work on Facebook’s third-party fact-checking programme. In countries as linguistically diverse as Nigeria, South Africa, Kenya and Senegal, fact-checking in local languages is vital. Not only does it let us fact-check more content on Facebook, it also means we’ll be reaching more people across Africa with verified, credible information.
Noko Makgato – Executive Director Africa Check