Misinformation and social media have become inseparable from one another; as platforms like Twitter and Facebook have grown to globe-spanning size, so too has the threat posed by the spread of false content. In the midst of a volatile election season in the US and a raging global pandemic, the power of information to alter opinions and save lives (or endanger them) is on full display. In the first of two exclusive interviews with two of the tech world’s most powerful people, Technology Review’s Editor-in-Chief Gideon Lichfield sits down with Facebook CTO Mike Schroepfer to talk about the challenges of combating false and harmful content on an online platform used by billions around the world. This conversation is from the EmTech MIT virtual conference and has been edited for length and clarity.

For more of coverage on this topic, check out this week's episode of Deep Tech: https://cms.megaphone.fm/channel/deep-tech?selected=MIT6065037377 and our coverage at https://www.technologyreview.com/topic/tech-policy/

Credits: This episode from EmTech was produced by Jennifer Strong and Emma Cillekens, with special thanks to Brian Bryson and Benji Rosen. We’re edited by Michael Reilly and Gideon Lichfield.