Facebook 'expert' feature raises trust concerns
Facebook is rolling out a way to designate topic "Experts" inside user-run Facebook groups. Facebook said groups were subject to its community standards - and that people who had received more than three "Strikes" for violating those standards in the past 90 days, would not be eligible to be marked as "Experts". As part of the rollout, Facebook said it is also experimenting with ways to let group admins find true experts on a topic to invite to their groups. So while Facebook's plan to allow group admins to appoint experts initially looks appealing as a means of bringing trusted content to users, it offers up the question of whether these experts will be entirely trustworthy. With group admins being the final arbiter of who is an expert, it follows that an admin who tolerates or even promotes conspiratorial ideas may not be best placed to decide who is an "Expert".