Facebook Removes 26.9 Million Hate Content in three Months
TECH DIGEST – Facebook has said it took action on 26.9 million pieces of hate speech content in the fourth quarter of 2020.
The social network disclosed this in its Community Standards Enforcement Report, which provided metrics on how the company enforced its policies from October through December 2020, including metrics across 12 policies on Facebook and 10 on Instagram.
It noted that the hate content was up from 22.1 million in Q3, partly due to updates in its technology in Arabic, Spanish and Portuguese.
On Instagram, 6.6 million pieces of hate speech content were reported, up from 6.5 million in Q3. There were also 308,000 pieces of organised hate content, up from 224,000 in Q3.
Facebook also reported that it took down 6.3 million pieces of bullying and harassment content from its platform in the fourth quarter of 2020, up from 3.5 million in Q3 partly due to updates in its technology to detect comments.
Instagram had five million pieces of bullying and harassment content, up from 2.6 million in Q3 due in part to updates in its technology to detect comments.
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According to the report, Facebook’s proactive rate for bullying and harassment went from 26 per cent in Q3 to 49 per cent in Q4 on Facebook, and 55 per cent to 80 per cent on Instagram.
The Vice President, Integrity, at Facebook, Guy Rosen, said, “Last quarter, we shared the prevalence of hate speech on Facebook for the first time to show the percentage of times people see this type of content on our platform.
“This quarter, hate speech prevalence dropped, seven to eight views of hate speech for every 10,000 views of content.”
The company also took action on 2.5 million pieces of suicide and self-injury content in Q4, up from 1.3 million in Q3 due to increased reviewer capacity.
On Instagram, it blocked 3.4 million pieces of suicide and self-injury content, up from 1.3 million in Q3.
Facebook said in the report it would share additional metrics on Instagram and add new policy categories on Facebook.
The social network has also been reported to have plans of building an audio chat product similar to audio app, Clubhouse, as the social network aims to expand into new forms of communication.
According to the New York Times, two people with knowledge of the matter said Facebook executives had ordered employees to create a similar product.
The sources said the product was in its earliest stages of development, adding that the project’s code name could change.
