Consumption of news dropped immediately after Facebook’s ban: Nielsen

Data compiled by Nielsen shows that Facebook’s ban on news content in Australia had an immediate impact on publishers yesterday (18 February), with several metrics for audience measurement in immediate decline compared to the past six weeks.

Nielsen used its Digital Content Ratings methodology – which provides data each month on traffic volumes for tagged websites and apps regardless of the source being on or off-platform – to track total sessions and total time spent for the Current Events & Global News category yesterday.

Total Sessions for the category fell by 16.1% on 18 February, when compared with the average of the previous six Thursdays. Meanwhile, Total Time Spent was down by 13% versus the average of the past six Thursdays.