Zuckerberg, Pichai, Dorsey to face US misinformation hearing

"Whether it be falsehoods about the Covid-19 vaccine or debunked claims of election fraud, these online platforms have allowed misinformation to spread, intensifying national crises with real-life, grim consequences for public health and safety," Pallone said

San Francisco: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey will face a new US House hearing next month on the spread of misinformation on their platforms.

Set for March 25, the hearing will grill the tech CEOs on misinformation and disinformation plaguing online platforms.

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Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Frank Pallone, Jr. announced on Thursday that the Communications and Technology Subcommittee and the Consumer Protection and Commerce Subcommittee will hold this joint hearing online.

“Whether it be falsehoods about the Covid-19 vaccine or debunked claims of election fraud, these online platforms have allowed misinformation to spread, intensifying national crises with real-life, grim consequences for public health and safety,” Pallone said in a statement on Thursday.

“This hearing will continue the Committee’s work of holding online platforms accountable for the growing rise of misinformation and disinformation,” Pallone added.

Dorsey and Zuckerberg previously appeared before the US Congress in November, for the Senate Judiciary’s hearing on moderation and misinformation labelling.

This will be the first hearing by the tech giants after the Capital Chaos on January 6 and various actions the companies took in the wake of the attack.

“For far too long, big tech has failed to acknowledge the role they’ve played in fomenting and elevating blatantly false information to its online audiences,” the House Energy and Commerce Committee said.

“Industry self-regulation has failed. We must begin the work of changing incentives driving social media companies to allow and even promote misinformation and disinformation,” the committee noted.

The tech platforms are facing intense scrutiny over the spread of fake news, hate speech and misinformation on their platforms for quite some time and have not been able to satisfy the governments worldwide with their answers.