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By Paresh Dave
SAN FRANCISCO, Nov 15 (Reuters) - Facebook Inc Chairman and Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg on Thursday defended his response to Russian election meddling on the world's largest social media network and issued a new plan aimed at stifling misbehavior while maintaining a vibrant hub for online speech.
His comments in a conference call with journalists and in a Facebook post followed a New York Times report on Wednesday that contended that he and other executives tried to deflect criticism internally and in Congress about Russian propaganda spreading through Facebook during the last three years.
Many U.S. lawmakers said after the report that the government must regulate or investigate Facebook, which has become a daily source of information for more than 2 billion people globally.
Zuckerberg said on Thursday that he has acted swiftly to combat the Russian challenge and supports regulation that would encourage companies to reduce the prevalence of "harmful content."
He announced several self-regulatory measures, including rough plans to create an independent body by the end of 2019 to review appeals from users who contend their content was wrongly banned. Users also would get a new choice on whether they want to view "borderline content" in their news feeds, he said.
"I've increasingly come to believe that Facebook should not make so many important decisions about free expression and safety on our own," Zuckerberg wrote.
Facebook shares fell 0.3 percent on Thursday, plus an additional 0.3 percent after hours.
Increased regulation is among the biggest threats to Facebook, along with increasing user unease about the service being a safe and secure place to converse, according to financial analysts.
Company profit margins have narrowed in recent quarters as it executes Zuckerberg's initial plan to combat misbehavior: spending aggressively on people and technology to bolster monitoring.
NEW PLAN, NEW DATA
Details of the appeals body are evolving, but the goal is to increase accountability of removal decisions and ensure they are not being driven by commercial reasons, Zuckerberg said.
Facebook's appeals process would expand to enable people who complain about content to seek second opinions if it is not removed initially. In addition, Facebook would become transparent about their rationale as well as policy changes, he said.
His announcement came as part of an update on Facebook's Transparency Report, which discloses how the company deals with inappropriate content and requests for user data by governments.