Ottawa — Some Facebook and Instagram users should expect changes to their news feed in the coming weeks as Meta, the two networks’ parent company, prepares to conduct attempts to block access to content published by news media outlets in Canada to be produced.

The Silicon Valley giant is therefore following Google’s lead and will conduct trials for much of June to prevent certain Canadian users from seeing articles, reels and stories published by the media. information on its platforms.

In response to a federal government bill, Google conducted similar technical trials for about five weeks earlier this year.

The C-18 bill currently before the Senate will force digital giants to enter into fair compensation agreements with news companies for the distribution of their journalistic content.

But the digital giants reject this bill. Meta has previously given assurances that it will block news content in Canada if Parliament passes the Online News Act, which the government says could happen in the next few weeks.

Rachel Curran, public policy manager at Meta Canada, confirmed trials will be conducted in June to identify any issues before Facebook and Instagram block media content outright.

This first round of testing will affect 1% to 5% of Meta’s 24 million Canadian users. The exact number of people affected will vary over the course of the studies.

Canadian users of these tests are selected at random and cannot view or share Canadian news content on Instagram or Facebook.

However, the impact will not be the same for all users targeted by these tests.

“It’s not necessarily going to be a uniform test. Some links to articles cannot be shared on Facebook, but the situation might be different on Instagram,” Ms. Curran explained in an interview with The Canadian Press.

Canadian Heritage Minister Pablo Rodriguez responded to the news on Thursday evening. On Twitter, he emphasized that “the fact that Facebook still refuses to work with Canadians shows how irresponsible and out of touch they are”.

“This is yet another disappointment on the part of the web giants and Canadians are not intimidated by this tactic,” he added.

Meta will also randomly contact certain media channels to inform them that certain people in Canada will not be able to see or share their news content during testing. However, they still have access to their accounts, business pages, and ads.

International media, such as the New York Times or the BBC, could also have their content blocked during the tests in Canada if they are randomly selected. However, people outside of Canada are not affected.

“The effects will only be felt during your stay in Canada,” Curran said.

Different views

Meta defines news as outlined in the Liberal Government’s Online News Act.

“The bill provides that news organizations will be covered if they report on, explain, or follow up an investigation into a topical issue or event of public interest,” Curran said.

Content that does not meet this definition will not be blocked for Canadians. When Facebook blocked news in Australia under a similar bill in 2021, experts feared the social network was running out of reliable sources and giving way to sites reporting fake news.

However, Ms Curran argued that Canadians will always have access to reliable information from a variety of sources, including government sites, organizations and universities.

“We think you can find good information there. (…) This is great information that continues to be shared and seen,” she said, adding that Meta will continue to fight misinformation on its platforms through an international fact-checking program.

The purpose of the meta test is to ensure that only media content is blocked, not that of other companies or organizations. The company wants to be sure they are not inadvertently preventing the sharing of content by emergency services, community organizations, politicians or government sites, as has happened in Australia.

Mainstream media have praised the Liberals’ online news draft because it would allow them to recoup some of the money they’ve lost to digital giants in recent years.

For her part, Ms Curran mentioned that the removal of journalistic content from Meta’s platforms was a purely commercial decision and that the company generates “negligible amounts” in revenue from media articles.

According to Meta, less than 3% of the posts Facebook users see in their news feed contain links to journalistic articles – a percentage that many users already feel is too high.

“We’re under a lot of competitive pressure and are struggling to grab users’ time and attention,” said Ms. Curran.

“Of course, news has value from a social point of view. It is valuable for our democracy. But they just don’t have much commercial or economic value for our company.”