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Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

reuters.com

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Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#11

Post by toomanybeersies »

There has been a big problem in India with lynch mobs being formed in Whatsapp groups, over various unsubstantiated rumours, including apparent child snatchers travelling through villages [1].

This raises an interesting cross section of moral issues. Obviously end-to-end encryption is good for a lot of reasons. But end-to-end encryption is one of the reasons that these lynchings have been able to happen. These kinds of lynchings have been going on forever, but Whatsapp and mobile phones have allowed these rumours to spread faster than ever before, and for mobs to form so much easier.

Does the right to privacy outweigh people's right to travel without fear of being lynched?

[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-india-44856910

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#12

Post by krasin »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #11

There has been a big problem in India with lynch mobs being formed in Whatsapp groups, over various unsubstantiated rumours, including apparent child snatchers travelling through villages [1]. This raises an interesting cross section of moral issues. Obviously end-to-end encryption is good for a lot of reasons. But end-to-end encryption is one of the reasons that these lynchings have been able to happen. These kinds…

>But end-to-end encryption is one of the reasons that these lynchings have been able to happen

Have all participants of the lynchings being prosecuted? Enforcing civil and criminal codes is enough to stop them.

There's no need to blame end-to-end encryption. It's not the tool, it's the people.

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#13

Post by PhasmaFelis »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #5

I really don't see why Facebook is blamed for this. That ethnic tension was present way before Facebook even existed. It was kept in check by an authoritarian military dictatorship and then bubbled up in the transition to more democracy, which really shouldn't have been unexpected. Facebook was just there at the wrong time, and happened to be the way people were communicating at that time; Aung San Suu Kyi has also g…

> Even with China-level censorship, they would probably need serious manual effort or even a complete network shutdown to stop being a medium.

Yep.

You sound like you don't think they should do that, though.

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#15

Post by ardy42 »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #9
ardy42 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really don't see why Facebook is blamed for this. That ethnic tension was present way before Facebook even existed. I think it's because they were given ample, clear warnings that their platform was being used to incite ethnic hatred and genocide, but chose to do nothing for years . I don't think they would be getting so nearly so much blame if they hadn't been so utterly negligent about the problem. They didn't…

The challenge of course, is multifaceted: 1. It's not a trivial problem to be able to identify what is hate speech in a regional dialect automatically 2. It sets a problematic precedent if Facebook throws 100s of - hard to find, hard to pay and hard to support - native language local reviewers at every place where Facebook could be abused. I'm no Facebook apologist, however I recognize how hard of a technical problem…

> It sets a problematic precedent if Facebook throws 100s of - hard to find, hard to pay and hard to support - native language local reviewers at every place where Facebook could be abused.

In what way is that a problematic precedent? Their negligence contributed to ethnic cleansing and genocide. If a multi-billion dollar company is too cheap to hire local staff to watch its platform, it shouldn't operate a localized version for that place. They need to act responsibly. Think if it like product safety testing.

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#16

Post by humbledrone »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #11

There has been a big problem in India with lynch mobs being formed in Whatsapp groups, over various unsubstantiated rumours, including apparent child snatchers travelling through villages [1]. This raises an interesting cross section of moral issues. Obviously end-to-end encryption is good for a lot of reasons. But end-to-end encryption is one of the reasons that these lynchings have been able to happen. These kinds…

Assuming that you agree that the government should not have the right to install mandatory CCTV cameras in private residences, where do you draw the line between that and eavesdropping on people's digital communications?

What is it about digital communications that makes it reasonable for the government to listen in? I don't see any difference between the government CCTV in your bedroom and the Whatsapp case, except that Whatsapp could be spied upon much more cheaply and efficiently (were it not encrypted).

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#17

Post by seanmcdirmid »

woah wrote: post #14

Interestingly, this article is written from the perspective that Facebook is responsible for everything posted on its website.

This is actually an interesting question, from a legal standpoint anyways. I don't think Myanmar has a safe harbor exemption like the US does, they actually have some pretty heavy handed censorship laws on the books. However, Facebook doesn't even have an office in Myanmar, they aren't officially there, and without a GFW Myanmar can't really block Facebook (nor would the people be ok with that, as Facebook has already become the internet to many).

Probably why Facebook won't be opening an office in Myanmar anytime soon, at least until they can sort these issues out and have some strong legs to stand on.

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#18

Post by droopyEyelids »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #8
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #5

I really don't see why Facebook is blamed for this. That ethnic tension was present way before Facebook even existed. It was kept in check by an authoritarian military dictatorship and then bubbled up in the transition to more democracy, which really shouldn't have been unexpected. Facebook was just there at the wrong time, and happened to be the way people were communicating at that time; Aung San Suu Kyi has also g…

Sadly this is just the way of the world. If Facebook completely blocked all access to users in Myanmar, there would still be equivalent horrors happening, just mobilized elsewhere. People like to blame/target the largest entity around as though it's job is to be mediator and police. That's taking the bad with the good. You see a similar story with the US Government often. Groups will condemn US intervention in some p…

Your perspective is an interesting distillation of a popular meme.

In it's abstract form, the idea is something like "Anything I do is justified, because if I didn't do it, someone else would."

From the way I see the world, it seems completely insane but it obviously seems like common sense to a huge part of the population.

I just don't get it! How many other Facebook sized companies, with Facebook's staff of engineers, willing to completely disregard the ethical consequences of behavior, do you think are competing for Facebook's market?

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#19

Post by repsilat »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #17
woah wrote: post #14

Interestingly, this article is written from the perspective that Facebook is responsible for everything posted on its website.

This is actually an interesting question, from a legal standpoint anyways. I don't think Myanmar has a safe harbor exemption like the US does, they actually have some pretty heavy handed censorship laws on the books. However, Facebook doesn't even have an office in Myanmar, they aren't officially there, and without a GFW Myanmar can't really block Facebook (nor would the people be ok with that, as Facebook has alread…

Linking this explicitly to safe harbour like you've done is important -- the knee-jerk response online is often to condemn Facebook for not policing content but to defend content hosters for not being able to filter out all instances of copyright violations.

Maybe those positions are held by different people, and maybe there's some good-faith "make an effort" middleground, and maybe the standards should be different because nobody dies when someone pirates Westworld, but they're clearly analogous.

If we do have different standards we should be able to back it up with argument, and try hard not to let how much we like the companies colour our judgement.

Re: Why Facebook is losing the war on hate speech in Myanmar

#20

Post by charlesism »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #9
ardy42 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I really don't see why Facebook is blamed for this. That ethnic tension was present way before Facebook even existed. I think it's because they were given ample, clear warnings that their platform was being used to incite ethnic hatred and genocide, but chose to do nothing for years . I don't think they would be getting so nearly so much blame if they hadn't been so utterly negligent about the problem. They didn't…

The challenge of course, is multifaceted: 1. It's not a trivial problem to be able to identify what is hate speech in a regional dialect automatically 2. It sets a problematic precedent if Facebook throws 100s of - hard to find, hard to pay and hard to support - native language local reviewers at every place where Facebook could be abused. I'm no Facebook apologist, however I recognize how hard of a technical problem…

    > It's not a trivial problem to be able to 
    > identify what is hate speech in a regional 
    > dialect automatically
This sentiment, which I read repeatedly, really irritates me. Most of us program here. It's not that hard a problem! When social media execs claim it is, what they really mean is "it's a hard problem to solve for us, because we are unwilling to risk losing any percentage of account sign-ups ever, under any circumstances."

The irony is that they are so timid about their precious sign-ups that they act against their own interest. For example, YouTube won't risk a short term dip in user retention metrics to scrub garbage from their comments... even though doing so would likely greatly increase sign-ups in the long term.

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