On Friday, 16 July 2021, Joe Biden said that platforms like Facebook are “killing people” for allowing misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines to be posted. He has since withdrawn his statement, explaining what he meant by it.
“Look, the only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated. And they’re killing people,” the US president told reporters at the White House on Friday.
Joe Biden withdraws statement Facebook is ‘killing people’
On Monday he withdrew his statement, saying that Facebook isn’t killing people, but the information that is posted on the platform by people is killing people. He also said that his statement was a mere alarm to the company — to be wary of the content posted on their platform as it could potentially harm people.
Standing in front of reporters, Biden said that he read in an article that 60% of the misinformation came from people who posted on Facebook and that his answer to the reporters on Friday was based on that.
The US President has been in constant battles with Facebook
Biden has been in constant battles with tech giants, one of which includes, signing an order to limit these companies from growing more than the government and limiting competition in the market.
The tech giants, which include Facebook have also been accused of acquiring small businesses to kick them out of the competition so that the giants remain in the front line, growing bigger and better than before.
They have also been accused of stealing data from their consumers to stand a better chance of winning against their closest competitors.
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