Meta's recent decision to flag correct information about an attack on Kyiv as false has raised questions about the fact-checking mechanisms used by social media companies.
After UNESCO-listed Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra monastery was damaged during Russia's missile and drone attack on Kyiv in mid-June 2026, Nataliia Shknieieva from Sydney shared the news on her Facebook page.
But she soon received a notification stating that her post was false, according to Meta's third-party fact-checking partner.
So did other Ukrainian community members in Australia, along with Facebook users in Ukraine, including some Ukrainian media outlets.
Facebook stated that my post would be marked as false and that all of my posts would be pushed down in people's news feeds.Nataliia Shknieieva, member of the Ukrainian community in Sydney
Nataliia's attempts to appeal the decision were rejected by Facebook.
But the information she shared was true and accurate.
SBS Examines studied the flagged posts, and found Meta's system had applied its fact-check ratings incorrectly, labelling posts containing correct information as false.
When contacted about the error, a spokesperson for Meta told SBS Examines the notifications were a result of a "technical error". The false ratings have since been removed.
Meta apologised to those impacted and said they were working to prevent similar errors.
In this week's episode, SBS Examines looks into the fact-checking mechanisms used by social media platforms, and asks whether they are doing enough to combat disinformation.
This story was produced in collaboration with SBS Ukrainian.
