Beautiful Virgin Islands

Wednesday, Aug 27, 2025

Calls for Facebook, Twitter to halt trending sections ahead of election gather steam

Calls for Facebook, Twitter to halt trending sections ahead of election gather steam

The Mozilla Foundation sent a letter on Tuesday to Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey demanding they halt their trending features ahead of the 2020 election.

Calls for Twitter and Facebook to temporarily halt their respective trending features in the U.S. ahead of the 2020 presidential election are gaining steam with just two weeks until Election Day.

The Mozilla Foundation, a nonprofit supporting public Internet service, on Tuesday sent a letter with more than 6,000 signatures to the two social media giants demanding they "immediately turn off two features that can amplify disinformation: Facebook's Group Recommendations and Twitter's Trending Topics."



"This approach would solve an urgent and unmet goal: curbing disinformation at scale while protecting against bias," the letter reads. "Right now, a false or misleading trending topic or violent group can reach millions of people before other safeguards to label content or remove groups can take effect. These actions would apply equally and neutrally across your platforms in the U.S."


The letter also praises the two companies for taking "significant steps to curb the spread of disinformation related to the U.S. election: labeling false information, rejecting misleading ads, limiting retweets, and removing accounts and groups that promote lies, hate, conspiracy theories and violence."

The Mozilla Foundation bought a full-page ad in The Washington Post to promote the letter on Tuesday.

"We’ll continue our zero-tolerance approach to platform manipulation and any other attempts to undermine the integrity of our service," a Twitter spokesperson said in a statement to Fox Business.

The foundation is calling on users to sign letters addressed to Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter founder Jack Dorsey through the organization's website. It is also calling on users to tweet directly to Dorsey demanding the site's "Trending Topics" feature be temporarily removed ahead of Nov. 3.

The nonprofit and others who support removing trending features are using the hashtag #UntrendOctober to promote the idea that started gaining traction on social media in late August.

Civil rights organization The Sleeping Giants, which helped organize a boycott against Facebook in June called "Stop Hate for Profit" after George Floyd's death, is also promoting Untrend October.

"[Twitter] has not gone nearly far enough in trying to deal with disinformation. Keep #UntrendOctober going and ask [Jack Dorsey] to disable Trending Topics for October," the organization wrote in a Sept. 1 tweet.


Twitter announced in an October blog post that it would be adding additional context to its Trending Topics feature in the "For You" tab in the United States before the election.

The Twitter spokesperson said the company has been "strengthening" how it tackles "disinformation and attempts to manipulate Trends, and recently introduced a number of significant product and enforcement updates that go hand-in-hand with the increased context that now accompany Trends."

"Specifically, we will only surface Trends in the 'For You' tab in the United States that include additional context, to help people gain an informed understanding of the high volume public conversation in the US and also help reduce the potential for misleading information to spread," the spokesperson said.

Social media's role in handling information related to the 2020 election and other breaking news has come under scrutiny in recent weeks and months; some experts argue that the platforms have too much power while others say they are not doing enough to censor certain speech.

Organizations called on advertisers to boycott Facebook over the summer after the website allowed a post from President Trump saying, "When the looting starts, the shooting starts" in response to nationwide civil unrest after Floyd's death to remain published on the site despite Twitter's decision to censor it.

More recently, a number of Republican legislators have called on Twitter and Facebook to explain their reasoning behind their respective decision to censor a report from the New York Post about 2020 Democratic nominee Joe Biden's son, Hunter Biden, and his purported communication with the adviser to a Ukrainian energy company. The conversation has prompted questions about Section 230 of the 1996 Communications Decency Act, which gives liability protections to websites that allow users to post their own content.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told Fox News' Sean Hannity on Oct. 15 that Americans "ought to be able to sue" Facebook and Twitter for censoring certain posts and users.

“If you’ve been locked out of Twitter or if you can’t distribute this New York Post article on Facebook, you ought to be able to sue them," he said.

Newsletter

Related Articles

Beautiful Virgin Islands
0:00
0:00
Close
Manhunt in Australia: Armed Anti-Government Suspect Kills Police Officers Sent to Arrest Him
China Launches World’s Most Powerful Neutrino Detector
How Beijing-Linked Networks Shape Elections in New York City
Ukrainian Refugee Iryna Zarutska Fled War To US, Stabbed To Death
Elon Musk Sues Apple and OpenAI Over Alleged App Store Monopoly
2 Australian Police Shot Dead In Encounter In Rural Victoria State
Vietnam Evacuates Hundreds of Thousands as Typhoon Kajiki Strikes; China’s Sanya Shuts Down
UK Government Delays Decision on China’s Proposed London Embassy Amid Concerns Over Redacted Plans
A 150-Year Tradition to Be Abolished? Uproar Over the Popular Central Park Attraction
A new faith called Robotheism claims artificial intelligence isn’t just smart but actually God itself
Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner Purchases Third Property Amid Housing Tax Reforms Debate
HSBC Switzerland Ends Relationships with Over 1,000 Clients from Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Qatar, and Egypt
Sharia Law Made Legally Binding in Austria Despite Warnings Over 'Incompatible' Values
Italian Facebook Group Sharing Intimate Images Without Consent Shut Down Amid Police Investigation
Dutch Foreign Minister Resigns Amid Deadlock Over Israel Sanctions
Trump and Allies Send Messages of Support to Ukraine on Independence Day Amid Ongoing Conflict
China Reels as Telegram Chat Group Shares Hidden-Camera Footage of Women and Children
Sam Nicoresti becomes first transgender comedian to win Edinburgh Comedy Award
Builders uncover historic human remains in Lancashire house renovation
Australia Wants to Tax Your Empty Bedrooms
MotoGP Cameraman Narrowly Avoids Pedro Acosta Crash at Hungarian Grand Prix
FBI Investigates John Bolton Over Classified Documents in High-Profile Raids
Report reveals OpenAI pitched national ChatGPT Plus subscription to UK ministers
Labour set to freeze income tax thresholds in long-term 'stealth' tax raid
Coca‑Cola explores sale of Costa coffee chain
Trial hears dog walker was chased and fatally stabbed by trio
Restaurateur resigns from government hospitality council over tax criticism
Spanish City funfair shut after serious ride injury
Suspected arson at Ilford restaurant leaves three in critical condition
Tottenham beat Manchester City to go top of Premier League
Bank holiday heatwave to hit 30°C before remnants of Hurricane Erin arrive
UK to deploy immigration advisers to West Africa to block fake visas
Nurse who raped woman continued working for a year despite police alert
Drought forces closures of England’s canal routes, canceling boat holidays
Sweet tooth scents: food-inspired perfumes surge as weight-loss drugs suppress appetites
Experts warn Britain dangerously reliant on imported food
Family of Notting Hill Carnival murder victim call event unmanageable
Bunkers, Billions and Apocalypse: The Secret Compounds of Zuckerberg and the Tech Giants
Ukraine Declares De Facto War on Hungary and Slovakia with Terror Drone Strikes on Their Gas Lifeline
Animated K-pop Musical ‘KPop Demon Hunters’ Becomes Netflix’s Most-Watched Original Animated Film
New York Appeals Court Voids Nearly $500 Million Civil Fraud Penalty Against Trump While Upholding Fraud Liability
Elon Musk tweeted, “Europe is dying”
Far-Right Activist Convicted of Incitement Changes Gender and Demands: "Send Me to a Women’s Prison" | The Storm in Germany
Hungary Criticizes Ukraine: "Violating Our Sovereignty"
Will this be the first country to return to negative interest rates?
Child-free hotels spark controversy
North Korea is where this 95-year-old wants to die. South Korea won’t let him go. Is this our ally or a human rights enemy?
Hong Kong Launches Regulatory Regime and Trials for HKD-Backed Stablecoins
China rehearses September 3 Victory Day parade as imagery points to ‘loyal wingman’ FH-97 family presence
Trump Called Viktor Orbán: "Why Are You Using the Veto"
×