Governments need to work with tech companies to curb hate speech, says Facebook anti-terror chief

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As the Irish government undertakes a public consultation to curb a rise in hate crimes, Facebook's counter terrorism chief tells TheJournal,ie that governments need to talk to tech companies to stop it rising further.

Image: Shutterstock/Lenka Horavova Image: Shutterstock/Lenka Horavova TECH GIANTS LIKE Facebook, Google and Twitter have built empires on the appeal of social media to consumers and businesses but the invasion of hate speech and terrorist activity on their platforms is a major growing concern, according to Facebook’s counter terrorism chief.

In the first three-quarters of the year, Facebook removed some 18 million pieces of terrorist content – including images, posts, and commentary from individuals or organisations it deems to be inciting hate or violence, or engaged in terrorism. We need clarity if governments are going to paint broad-brush statements about extremism, it’s a very grey term, so especially if we’re going to get refinement and legislation. “We just want to know where we stand and what they actually mean or else we’re going to be over-compensating and we don’t want to remove a vast horde of speech that is otherwise completely uncontroversial and not violent.”

It uses the UN Security Council Consolidated list of terrorist groups, along with lists compiled by the EU and the US as a basis for its policies around what should and should not be removed. “We have a public policy team just for Ireland and increasingly we have them in a lot of countries. They will have a person or an entire team just focused on that country.

A better understanding of what governments think should be considered as hate speech in their jurisdictions – what Facebook term as ‘culturally sensitive’ hate speech – would provide a better understanding of what it should or shouldn’t be removing from its platform, says Saltman. “Sometimes [we see it] because the media has spoken to or documented crimes that have taken place in the real world. For dangerous organisations, we’re looking at behaviours and that doesn’t have to be behaviours just on our platform. We’re looking at both online and offline behaviours of a group.

 

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facebookai facebook I think FB has that the wrong way around. *It* and other tech firms have to work with the government and with other governments, not make demands they work with it. Bloody cheek. The sooner their hubris is regulated, the better.

So when the Governments senior ministers themselves use the same media to unfairly back and support an abortion regime in a referendum is that not regarded as hate speech by Christians?

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