Tech Talk | How Dominant are Privacy, Misinformation & Mental Health Issues in Facebook and Instagram?

Meta, the father or mother firm of two main social media platforms Facebook and Instagram, finds itself hitting the headlines nearly yearly for flawed causes akin to privateness, misinformation and psychological well being.

Recently, in a judgment in opposition to the social media community for breaking European Union’s information privateness requirements, Meta was fined a file $1.3 billion and informed to stop transferring information obtained from Facebook customers in Europe to the US. This occurred due to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which got here into impact in 2018.

But when Meta was requested to disclose particulars concerning the storage areas of information collected from Indian customers, it didn’t reply. The firm will not be sure by any regulation to both reply to a question like this or erase somebody’s information from the servers if they’re requested to take action.

However, the Digital Personal Data Protection Bill, which is analogous to the EU’s privateness regulation, might change the state of affairs. The Bill talks concerning the “right to correction and erasure of personal data” but additionally contains cross-border information switch below particular phrases about which some have raised questions.

Coming again to the purpose, as per an professional, the phrases of service for these social media platforms usually state that consumer information could also be used for analytical or efficiency optimisation functions by the corporate and this strongly means that the corporate has entry to consumer information each inside and out of doors the nation. Although points like information security and privateness insurance policies might not fear the vast majority of Indian customers, with rising digitisation, the attention ratio can also be anticipated to develop.

But there are a couple of extra regarding elements which can straight impression Indian Facebook and Instagram customers. One of those points is psychological well being. In 2021, in keeping with reviews, Facebook’s inner analysis concerning the impression of Instagram revealed that the social media community knew that it has a damaging impact on teenagers’ psychological well being. But Facebook later stated: “It is simply not accurate that this research demonstrates Instagram is ‘toxic’ for teen girls.”

However, the American Psychological Association’s web site says: “Studies have linked Instagram to depression, body image concerns, self-esteem issues, social anxiety, and other problems. By design, the app capitalises on users’ biological drive for social belonging — and nudges them to keep on scrolling.”

It is value mentioning right here that as extra Indians have gotten ‘Digital Nagriks’, extra points about such platforms have gotten the norm, together with scams and pretend news. For instance, researchers discovered a malware marketing campaign began by cybercriminals in mid-February utilizing the recognition of ChatGPT.

It affected 13 Facebook accounts or pages, with over 500K followers, together with one Indian web page which had over 2 lakh followers. The cybercriminals additionally ran Facebook adverts selling the “newest model of ChatGPT, GPT- V4″, which, when downloaded, installs malware on the victim’s device.

A social media expert recently revealed that random profiles verified with a Blue Tick are messaging users with a phony link, redirecting them to install malware.

In the case of misleading information, in March, a Washington State University-led analysis found that Facebook users were more likely than Twitter and other social media users to view fake news regarding the 2020 US presidential election. This shows that the company, which faced a series of questions during US Senate hearings regarding misinformation and user safety, is not doing enough.

The issue of misleading information in India led the government to introduce a new fact-check unit. The IT Ministry recently notified revisions to the Information Technology Rules, 2021, allowing the ministry to designate a fact-checking committee to determine whether online content related to the Union government is correct.

So, if any content is flagged as false by the fact-checking unit, platforms like Facebook and Instagram will be compelled to remove it, or risk losing their safe harbour, which protects them from third-party content lawsuits.

Also, it’s value mentioning that contemplating the best way these platforms have been coping with public grievance reviews, the federal government earlier determined to create the Grievance Appellate Committee, which is presently coping with 62 instances and has disposed of 46 instances.​