Slashdot Mirror


Facebook is Rating Users Based On Their 'Trustworthiness' (engadget.com)

Facebook has begun to assign its users a reputation score, predicting their trustworthiness on a scale from zero to 1. From a report: Facebook hasn't been shy about rating the trustworthiness of news outlets, but it's now applying that thinking to users as well. The company's Tessa Lyons has revealed to the Washington Post that it's starting to assign users reputation scores on a zero-to-one scale. The system is meant to help Facebook's fight against fake news by flagging people who routinely make false claims against news outlets, whether it's due to an ideological disagreement or a personal grudge. This isn't the only way Facebook gauges credibility, according to Lyons -- it's just one of thousands of behavior markers Facebook is using. The problem: much of how this works is a mystery. Facebook wouldn't say exactly how it calculates scores, who gets these scores and how other factors contributed to a person's trustworthiness.

1 of 320 comments (clear)

  1. No it's not by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Facebook is an opt-in service

    No it's not. We've known for years that Spybook has profiles on individuals who have never signed up.