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Meta shuts key tool used to track falsehoods


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A digital tool considered vital in tracking viral falsehoods, CrowdTangle is to be decommissioned by Facebook owner Meta in a major election year, a move researchers fear will disrupt efforts to detect an expected fire hose of political misinformation. Killing off the monitoring tool, a move experts say is in line with a tech industry trend of rolling back transparency and security measures, is a major blow as dozens of countries hold elections this year — a period when bad actors typically spread false narratives more than ever. “In a year where almost half of the global population is expected to vote in elections, cutting off access to CrowdTangle will severely limit independent oversight of harms,” said Melanie Smith, director of research at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue.

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