[ad_1] To address the site’s rampant harassment and hate speech, Instagram is going to the mat. They’ve updated their policies to include additional bulwarks against racist tropes such as blackface and Jewish stereotypes, strengthening protections for what the company designates “involuntary public figures” against troll mobs and harassment campaigns. Plus any account now found making […]
Category: hate speech
Facebook removes massive QAnon group over hate and harassment claims
[ad_1] Facebook just took down one of the larger targets in its crackdown on QAnon conspiracy theories. The social network told Reuters that it had removed Official Q/Qanon, a group with almost 200,000 members, after multiple posts reportedly violated policies against harassment, hate, and potentially harmful misinformation. The shutdown took effect August 4th, Facebook said, […]
Twitter will block links promoting hate speech and violence
[ad_1] Twitter is closing a loophole in its rules to make it harder for users to spread hate speech and violent content. The company is updating its policies to ban links to content that promotes violence and hateful conduct. Twitter already had rules in place barring hateful conduct and violence in tweets, but the policy […]
Disney said to have ‘dramatically’ cut ad spending on Facebook amid boycott
[ad_1] If this is tied to the boycott, it could represent the largest financial blow yet to Facebook over claims its hate speech and misinformation policies are inadequate. Pathmatics estimated that Disney was Facebook’s top US advertiser in the first half of 2020, according to the WSJ. While it won’t necessarily cause significant hardship for […]
Tech’s overdue reckoning with hate speech still isn’t enough
[ad_1] To be clear, online hate groups have been around for far longer than Trump’s presidency. There have always been fringe groups on the internet — see 4chan and 8chan, for example, where forum users harassed women in the video game industry as part of Gamergate. They are often a radicalizing force, and connected to […]
Advertisers are running from Facebook. What’s next?
[ad_1] At this point, the question isn’t how big the advertising boycott will get, but what will it actually accomplish. So far, it’s not exactly clear. While the boycott has already succeeded in wiping away $56 billion from Facebook’s market value (and making Zuckerberg $7.2 billion poorer), we don’t really know how much money Facebook […]
Reddit bans r/the_donald for a pattern of inciting hate speech
[ad_1] Earlier this month, several high-profile Reddit pages took a hiatus in protest of the company’s refusal to ban racist content. This seems to have finally caused Reddit to redefine its policies around hate speech and how it enforces them. Today, the company announced that it has banned about 2,000 subreddits, including one of the […]
Starbucks pauses all social media ads over hate speech concerns
[ad_1] However long the pause lasts, Starbucks is adding to a list of major brands pulling their ads (largely from Facebook) to press for change, including Coca-Cola, Honda, Hershey and Engadget’s parent company Verizon. Facebook said it wouldn’t make policy changes in response to financial pressure, but nonetheless said it would label politicians’ posts when […]
The North Face pulls Facebook ads over hate and misinformation policies
[ad_1] Criticism of Facebook’s approaches to hate speech and misinformation may hit the social network where it hurts the most: its finances. CNN reports that clothing brand The North Face has become the most recognizable company yet to join an advocacy group-backed ad boycott of Facebook, pulling all its ads from both Facebook itself as […]
Facebook suspended hundreds of anti-racist skinheads and musicians
[ad_1] A Facebook spokesperson told Engadget that the move was a mistake and has since been corrected, but didn’t explain why. “We apologize to those affected by this issue,” the spokesperson said. “These accounts were removed in error and have been reinstated. We are reviewing what happened in this case and are taking steps to […]