The treatment of high-profile users, such as former US President Donald Trump, left dangerous content online, serving business interests at the expense of its human rights obligations.
A damning report published on Tuesday from the company's oversight board urged the social media giant to make " significant" changes to its internal system for reviewing.
The board, which started assessing cases last year, is coordinated by the tech giant's policy chief and former UK deputy prime minister Sir Nick Clegg.
The board was asked to look into the system after it was brought to the attention of The Wall Street Journal.
There is a chance that Trump will be allowed back on to the platform following a recommendation by the board.
The board has been investigating Meta for more than a year and has demanded that the company be more transparent about its procedures.
The report is one of the most in-depth probes yet into moderation issues at Meta, as the independent body has wrestled with concerns that it has little power to hold the company accountable.
It puts more pressure on the chief executive to ensure that Meta's content is policed fairly after he announced plans to cut 11,000 staff.
AdvertisementThe system has been changed by Meta. It was originally developed to double-check cases where there could be a higher risk for a mistake. He said that the company had developed a more standardized system with more controls.
It's not clear how many people are on the secret list. The Wall Street Journal estimated that 5.8 million people would be listed by 2020. There were 667,000 as of October 2021.
The system meant that the content posted by well-known people, such as Trump and Warren, would remain on the platform until the human reviewers had reviewed them.
It would take five days on average for this human review to take place, with the content left on the platform for up to seven months.
The board said that the company had failed to assess whether the system worked as intended.
Sometimes it took months for the company to respond to the investigation.
The board was referencing a Wall Street Journal report that detailed how Brazilian footballer Neymar posted non-consensual intimate imagery of another person on to his Facebook andInstagram accounts, which was viewed more than 50 million times before removal. There was a delay in reviewing the content due to a back up.
Thomas Hughes is the director of the oversight board.
He said that it opened up concerns about relationships between individuals in the company and whether they influenced decision-making.
He said that there was probably a conflation of interests.
Meta accused the social media company in September of withholding information on the system, following previous public tension between the board and the company. The board is seen by many as an attempt to distance the company from difficult decisions around free speech.
The recommendations have 90 days to be responded to.
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