Dikhyaa Mohanty 
Facebook blocked Australians from sharing or accessing news on the platform and the people witnessed empty news feeds on their Facebook pages.
As per the news report, the Facebook accounts of Australian publishers extending from the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) to the Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) and some local health authorities have been cleared. All Australians have been blocked from sharing any kind of news from local sources or accessing news from around the world on Facebook.
After which there was heavy criticism by the news producer, politicians, and human rights advocates particularly as it became clear that official health pages, welfare networks had all been scrubbed from the site along with the news.
Later in an official statement, Facebook stated that it made the move with a heavy heart in response to the federal government’s proposed media bargaining laws, which would force technology companies such as Google and Facebook to pay Australian news outlets for their content. Even the news proceeds up just 4 percent of what people view on its website, but for Australians Facebook’s role in news, delivery is growing.
As per a 2020 University of Canberra study, 21 percent of Australians use social media as their primary news source, up 3 percent from the previous year, while 39 percent of the population uses Facebook to receive news. Also, around 29 percent of Australian news video content is consumed on Facebook.
Will Easton, Facebook’s Australia and New Zealand managing director said that the proposed law fundamentally misunderstands the relationship between our platform and publishers who use it to share news content. He further added that this has left them facing a stark choice- attempt to comply with a law that ignores the realities of this relationship or stop allowing news content on our services in Australia.
News Source – BBC
Image Source – Google
