Meta ignores requests from researchers to shut down CrowdTangle

Meta ignores requests from researchers to shut down CrowdTangle is profiled by BTW Media because published evidence links it to internet infrastructure, governance, operational dependencies, or market visibility.

• Meta kills off misinformation tracking tool CrowdTangle despite pleas from researchers, journalists.
• Meta said Wednesday that CrowdTangle doesn’t provide a complete picture of what is happening on its platforms and said its new tools are more comprehensive.

OUR TAKE
CrowdTangle has been an industry best practice for real-time platform transparency. Approaching the election, this decision jeopardises an important pre- and post-election oversight mechanism at this critical time, undermining Meta’s ongoing efforts for transparency. Demonstrating the fragility of trust in society and digital democracy, Meta, as well as individual platforms, must take steps to limit the spread of disinformation, hate speech, and voter suppression on Facebook.
— Iydia Ding, BTW reporter

What happened

Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, has shut down CrowdTangle, a tool widely used by researchers, watchdog organisations and journalists to monitor social media posts, particularly for tracking how misinformation spreads across company platforms.

Plans for the Wednesday shutdown, announced earlier this year, were met with protests from researchers and non-profit organisations. In May, dozens of organisations, including the Center for Democracy and Technology, Human Rights Watch and New York University’s Center for Social Media & Politics, sent a letter to Meta asking the company to keep the tool running at least through January so that it can continue to be used during the U.S. presidential election.Meta has released a replacement for CrowdTangle called the Meta Content Library. But it is restricted to academic researchers and non-profit organisations, which excludes most news organisations. The company said on Wednesday that CrowdTangle doesn’t give a full picture of what’s happening on its platform, and said its new tool is more comprehensive.

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Why it’s important

For years, CrowdTangle has been an industry best practice for real-time platform transparency. Approaching the election, this decision jeopardises an important pre- and post-election oversight mechanism at this critical time, undermining Meta’s ongoing efforts for transparency. This incident shows the fragility of trust in society and digital democracy, and Meta, as well as platforms, must take steps to limit the spread of disinformation, hate speech, and voter suppression on Facebook.

If false information is allowed to continue to spread, it will have serious consequences for individuals and society. It not only infringes on the audience’s right to know and hinders their right to participate and monitor, but may also pose a threat to sound economic and political development and affect national security and social stability.

In order to combat disinformation, governments and relevant businesses should collaborate on human rights-based solutions, including raising awareness of disinformation, promoting critical thinking, and strengthening digital and media literacy .