Social media sites slow to act on hate speech
Photo © Anatoly Vartanov - Fotolia
(BRUSSELS) - U.S. social media such as Facebook and Twitter are taking too long to act on hate speech, the EU said Tuesday as it published an evaluation of a code of conduct signed in May.
The EU Commission published Tuesday a first evaluation of how social media such as Facebook and Twitter are applying a code of conduct to combat illegal online hate speech.
Initial results from a code agreed in May with IT companies Facebook, Google (YouTube), Twitter and Microsoft show that 28 per cent of all notifications of alleged illegal online hate speech lead to the removal of the flagged content.
However, only 40 per cent of all notifications are currently reviewed under 24 hours, while the aim of the code of conduct is to review the majority within 24 hours.
"Social media companies need to live up to their important role and take up their share of responsibility when it comes to phenomena like online radicalisation, illegal hate speech or fake news", said Vera Jourova, the Commissioner for Justice, Consumers and Gender Equality:" It is our duty to protect people in Europe from incitement to hatred and violence online. This is the common goal of the code of conduct."
IT companies have pledged in the code of conduct to review valid removal notifications against their community guidelines and where necessary national laws transposing the Framework Decision on combating racism and xenophobia in less than 24 hours and to remove or disable access to content, if necessary.
The first assessment was made by 12 NGOs based in 9 EU countries, who have analysed the responses to notifications over a period of six weeks.
The findings indicate that among the 600 notifications made in total, 28% lead to a removal, 40% of all responses were received within 24 hours while another 43% arrived after 48 hours.
The results are to be discussed at a High Level Group on combating racism, xenophobia and all forms of intolerance on 7 December 2016, by justice ministers at the Justice Council on 8 December as well as at the EU Internet forum.
A second monitoring exercise will take place in 2017 to assess progress and decide on next steps.