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Facebook Basically Says Social Media Can 'Damage' Democracy

A critical post by a Facebook employee says the social media site is trying to answer the hard questions.

By: Katie Cammarata

Posted at 2:26 PM, Jan 22, 2018

and last updated 2018-01-22 14:26:43-05

Facebook basically just admitted that social media can "damage" democracy.

One of Facebook's product managers wrote a critical post about how the 2016 U.S. presidential election is forcing the social media site to answer some hard questions.

It's part of a series on social media and democracy. In the post, Samidh Chakrabarti says social media "amplifies human intent — both good and bad."

He also lists a few changes, saying the company is offering users a few tools to learn more about advertisers, in some cases even showing who paid for an ad.

Chakrabarti also says Facebook is working with third-party fact checkers to help limit inaccurate news on Facebook.