Facebook Plans to Expand Program to Fight Against Online Hate-Speech
September 21 2016 - 11:20AM
Dow Jones News
Facebook Inc. plans to broaden a program that gives free
advertising to online activists that fight back against online
hate-speech, the latest expansion of tech-industry efforts to
undermine internet propaganda from Islamist terrorists and
far-right radicals.
The social-networking company said Wednesday that its
Berlin-based Online Civil Courage Initiative, founded in January,
will expand from a pilot phase focused on Germany, France and the
U.K. to offer advertising credits and marketing advice to a broader
array of groups.
Since its creation in January, the program has helped
organizations that use Facebook to counteract hateful or extremist
messages reach more than two million people with €10,000 ($11,174)
in advertising credits, the company said. Facebook has pledged €1
million in credits over two years.
Tech companies, think tanks, activists and governments are
pouring resources into new ways to fight back against violent
propaganda washing over the internet from Islamist groups and
far-right radicals. The logic is that since such messages can never
be blocked entirely, someone must argue against them, an approach
called counter-narratives or counter-speech.
"Censorship is not effective," said Erin Saltman, program
manager of Facebook's Online Civil Courage Initiative, who also
works with London-based think tank the Institute for Strategic
Dialogue. "Conversations would start on mainstream platforms and
migrate to less regulated, encrypted platforms."
Content removal is growing. Facebook said it has removed more
than 38,000 pieces of content in the European Union in the second
half of 2015 because of government requests, with the vast majority
from France following the Nov. 13 attacks in Paris. Twitter said in
August that it had removed 235,000 terrorist-related accounts in
the last six months, nearly double the prior period.
But tech companies argue that it will always be possible to find
similar material elsewhere online. Some Silicon Valley executives
say they are also uncomfortable automatically removing posts since
that could lead to a chilling effect on free speech. "Silencing a
conversation doesn't help win the argument," one tech executive
said.
While government efforts to counteract propaganda have largely
sputtered, private groups are taking up the initiative.
Facebook later Wednesday is participating in an event in New
York to highlight another initiative it has supported, in which
college students come up with campaigns to counteract violent
extremism. Other groups, are running experiments with companies
including Alphabet Inc., Twitter Inc. and Facebook on ways to use
the machinery of online advertising to counteract extremist
messages.
Started in January, Facebook's Online Civil Courage Initiative
was in part a response to criticism by German politicians that
extremists were using its website to spread hatred against
immigrants. The initiative aims to support nongovernmental
organizations who counter hateful comments with democratic
views—mounting things such as "like" attacks on pages rather than
removing them.
In the next year, Facebook plans to create a stand-alone website
for the Civil Courage Initiative so that organizations can find
information and marketing advice, Ms. said. The initiative will
also publish "trend reports where we can keep our finger on the
pulse a little more and keep activists updated with trends that are
taking place so they can react more in time," Ms. Saltman said.
Saltman
Simone Rafael of Amadeu Antonio Foundation, a German
anti-bigotry group, said the program's goal is to strengthen
communities that "stand up to a vocal minority of people who try to
create the impression they were the majority."
Write to Sam Schechner at sam.schechner@wsj.com and Friedrich
Geiger at friedrich.geiger@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
September 21, 2016 12:05 ET (16:05 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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