New Facebook tool lets users check interaction with Russian posts

IANS  |  San Francisco 

Coming under intense scrutiny for failing to prevent alleged Russian propaganda from spreading on its platform during the 2016 US presidential election, has introduced a tool that lets some users check if they interacted with such posts in the run up to the

The tool available through its specifically allows users to see if they followed or "Liked" any pages and accounts set up by Kremlin-backed trolls on either or Instagram, reported on Friday.

According to a estimate, roughly 140 million users might have seen Russian propaganda in their News Feeds or on over the course of the 2016

But only a fraction of those 140 million affected users can actually make use of Facebook's new tool.

The portal only helps those who directly followed one of the accounts or pages set up by Russian sources on and

It does not aid users who may have simply seen Russian-sponsored content because their friends "Liked" it and it subsequently appeared in their own News Feeds, the Recode report said.

Facebook's new service also does not allow users to check if they saw some of the roughly 3,000 election-timed ads purchased by trolls linked to

--IANS

gb/vm

(This story has not been edited by Business Standard staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

First Published: Sat, December 23 2017. 11:30 IST