A group of House Democratic leaders sent letters to the CEOs of the major social media companies to request information on how they are responding to disinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The letters were sent to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Google CEO Sundar Pichai, and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey.
“Over the past several months, we have seen a troubling rise of false or misleading information related to COVID-19 disseminated by domestic and foreign actors on platforms such as yours. This disinformation has ranged from false statements about certain groups being immune from contracting the virus to unsubstantiated assertions about masks and vaccines,” the lawmakers wrote. “This type of disinformation is dangerous and can affect the health and well-being of people who use this false information to make critical health decisions during this pandemic.”
The letters were signed by Reps. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), the House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair, Diane DeGette (D-CO), Mike Doyle (D-PA), and Jan Schakowsky (D-IL).
Last month, the European Commission asked certain social media companies to produce monthly reports detailing how they are addressing COVID-19 disinformation on their platforms. Facebook, Google, and Twitter all agreed to comply with the request.
“The Committee agrees that further transparency is needed to better understand both the scope of disinformation occurring on platforms and the actions that are being taken to curtail this problem,” the lawmakers wrote. “Given the Committee’s jurisdiction over consumer protection and its ongoing oversight efforts around COVID-19 disinformation, we request that your company provide the Committee with monthly reports similar in scope to what you are providing the European Commission regarding your COVID-19 disinformation efforts as they relate to United States users of your platform.”