Social network Facebook has revealed in a Friday announcement that it is making changes to its “real name” policy, by tweaking the process which requires users to verify their names. “We want to make it easier for people to confirm their name if necessary”. “This should help our Community Operations team better understand the situation”, Alex Schultz, Facebook’s VP of growth, wrote in a letter released today.
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The social network has been widely criticized by many who have very legitimate, normal reasons to use a name that differs from what they’re officially called. If all goes as planned, these changes will be arriving this upcoming December.
Facebook has said it is modifying its “real name” policy after this came under criticism from several activist groups.
Facebook will be making two main changes to its policy. At that moment, their representatives stated that it is part of the Facebook experience to engage with real people and not fake ones, to always know with whom you’re communicating out of safety reasons and because their studies had shown that close to 83 million Facebook accounts are fake.
Second, Facebook will also require users that flag others for employing alternate names to provide additional detail and information in their complaint.
Facebook also confirms that you no longer need a government-issued ID to confirm your name, things like bills and library cards work just fine.
This, of course, sparked much controversy and debate, from people who simply do not want to share such private information on a social platform like Facebook, to people from the LGBT communities and transgender people. The change should add more friction to the reporting process, potentially lessening the likelihood it will be used as a weapon, locking certain people out of their profiles via the name-proving process.
Schultz wrote in his reply: ‘It’s a balance to get this right – we want to find a line that minimizes bullying but maximises the potential for people to be their authentic selves on Facebook, ‘ he said.
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While the company still won’t commit to allowing pseudonyms, it has made a decision to introduce process improvements for those who are unfairly removed from the service for using a name by which people know them.
