Beginning of Facebook and Instagram News Censorship in Canada Commences Today
As previously announced, Meta has initiated the blocking of news content in Canada. Commencing today, users of Facebook and Instagram within the country will no longer have the ability to access or distribute news links, as well as view videos and photos shared by publishers and broadcasters. Meta, who has been warning about this significant action for several months, stated that it will take a few weeks for the alteration to be fully implemented for all users in Canada.
“News links and content published by Canadian news publishers and broadcasters will no longer be visible to Canadians,” Meta said. “We identify news channels based on legislative definitions and the guidelines of the Online News Act.” Content shared by international news organizations is also not visible on Facebook and Instagram in Canada.
Meta made the decision in response to Canadian lawmakers passing the Online News Act. The law requires certain platforms to negotiate revenue-sharing agreements with news organizations. The goal is to address the collapse in advertising revenue that news agencies have struggled with over the past two decades amid the growth of online services.
The CBC has noted that Facebook and Google absorb about 80 percent of their digital ad revenue. Google also plans to block Canadian users from accessing news articles for several of its products in response to the legislation.
Meta has previously played hardball with the government regarding news content. In early 2021, it blocked Australian users from sharing news links on Facebook. However, Meta, Google and other platform owners agreed and eventually reached an agreement to pay publishers there to post news links and snippets.
