Why Meta deleted 10 Million Facebook accounts

DW (English)

Meta’s AI has launched a major social media cleanup. Will it actually improve your online experience?

Transcript

00:00Meta deleted over 10 million Facebook profiles in the first half of 2025.

00:05Why?

00:06Because your feed and your trust are under attack from all kinds of spam.

00:10Let's break it down.

00:11What's going on, what is Meta doing, and how you can improve your feed?

00:15First, let's have a look at what accounts are being removed.

00:19Meta says it's targeting three types of accounts.

00:22Accounts pretending to be celebrities or influencers, especially in finance and politics.

00:26Think Elon Musk or Warren Buffet.

00:29Fake accounts in their names have been used in the past to scare millions of users with fake investment advice.

00:34Meta is also targeting content thieves.

00:37These accounts just repost viral content from others.

00:40Without giving them any credit, they are just banking on the likes and views.

00:44And finally, Meta goes for accounts that push AI-generated junk or AI-slop,

00:49such as spammy videos, memes, and auto-generated posts made to trick the algorithm and make money.

00:55A recent study shows, AI-created content has been pushed by Facebook's algorithm for a while.

01:01So this step seems overdue.

01:02By the way, YouTube is also tightening its rules.

01:05They are now blocking monetization for repetitive or low-value content, even if it's AI-generated.

01:11Social media taking out the trash.

01:13Sounds like a good idea to me.

01:15But how does Meta do it?

01:17To fight spam and fake accounts, Meta is turning to AI-powered detection tools.

01:22These systems can spot patterns in how fake accounts behave, like how often an account posts,

01:27what kind of language it uses, and whom it interacts with.

01:30They are also using machine learning models trained to detect impersonation and AI-generated content.

01:36If an account looks spammy, it might get deleted, demonetized, or penalized by having its reach reduced, for example.

01:42It's not an easy job to do, though, because Meta must clean up Facebook without punishing real users.

01:48So, would this make your feed better?

01:51That depends.

01:52Some creators are sounding the alarm.

01:54They say Meta's automated content check could flag legit content by mistake,

01:58and in the end hurt real creators the most.

02:01Others argue, Meta has to act.

02:03According to the company, in early 2025, 3% of Facebook's worldwide monthly active users were fake accounts.

02:10That's over 90 million.

02:12Let's see how this turns out.

02:14So, what can you do to improve your own feed?

02:17Clean it up.

02:18Unfollow spammy pages, report suspicious posts, and instead engage with creators you trust.

02:31And be skeptical.

02:32Especially of celebrity endorsements.

02:34If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

02:37Always verify before you click.

02:40That's it from us.

02:41Goodbye.

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