No, this photo doesn’t show Facebook’s community standards team

A photo of 12 people sitting at a restaurant table, smiling at the camera, is being shared on social media with an inaccurate description. 

"Facebook community standards team," one post says. "This is literally who bans us."

This post was flagged as part of Facebook’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Facebook.)

We did a reverse image search for the photo and found it’s been online since at least 2018. Back then, it appeared in what looks like a screenshot of a post in a Facebook group called "Flat Earth Believers." 

"Great discussion at the flat earth meet up today," the text in the post said. "We will be hosting these monthly for more information message us via this page." 

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stated on October 28, 2024 in in social media posts

"Nicki Minaj just endorsed Donald Trump for President.”

One forum where the image appeared had a link to the Flat Earth group’s Facebook account, but the page is no longer available. We reached out to an email address listed on the group’s Facebook page to ask if the image of the Flat Earth Believers post is authentic but did not hear back. 

We didn’t find any credible sources connecting the image to Facebook’s content policy team, which is responsible for developing the site’s community standards. 

"We have people in 11 offices around the world, including subject matter experts on issues such as hate speech, child safety and terrorism," Facebook wrote in a 2018 post, explaining its enforcement guidelines. "Many of us have worked on the issues of expression and safety long before coming to Facebook." 

According to that post, Facebook relies on a combination of artificial intelligence and reports from people to identify posts, pictures and other content that likely violate the platform’s community standards. Those reports are then reviewed by Facebook’s community operations team. 

You can see some of the people who work on Facebook’s community standards in this April 2019 video. They don’t appear to be the same people in the photo. 

We rate this post False.