Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes • Hacker News Board

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#101

Post by Xelbair » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:23 AM UTC

deanclatworthy wrote: post #61

These platforms can do no right. If Facebook/Youtube leave a video online of a beheading of John Smith from then inevitably calls them out for promoting and hosting this "illegal" content. Now, they're being chastised for taking it down too. Maybe, just maybe, these companies have internal processes for handing over such materials to the relevant authorities, and don't need to rely on armchair detectives to investiga…

Maybe, just maybe, we can decide if content platforms are responsible for user content or not.. and stick to that decision.

Quite frankly i am against any form of censorship.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#102

Post by HNthrow22 » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:27 AM UTC

dsfyu404ed wrote: post #98

HNthrow22 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Reddit is another example a company that has recently scrubbed itself of most controversial content, I agree with you on most points however reddit takes no action against extremists and fringe groups proliferating on their platform until substantial pressure is applied from either advertisers or journalists. They go as far as shadowbanning users who bring up their lack of action to shine a light on their culpabili…

> agree with you on most points however reddit takes no action against extremists and fringe groups proliferating on their platform until substantial pressure is applied from either advertisers or journalists. They banned IRA_memes because IRA I guess and quarantined waterniggas because it had "niggas" in the title even though the whole sub was just about drinking water. They're definitely taking an approach of culli…

> They're definitely taking an approach of culling anything that advertisers might not like.

This could not be further from reality, see https://old.reddit.com/r/AgainstHateSubreddits/comments/a3q6... to get a small preview of the attitudes of their executive team and the kind of content they allow to proliferate and spread on their platform.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#103

Post by megous » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:40 AM UTC

stef25 wrote: post #62

Couldn't they take down the content but keep it available for neutral third parties to evaluate and collect? There has to be a better way to collect evidence of war crimes than leaving decapitation videos visible on social media for all to see. Maybe the ICC could even launch their own platform where this kind of content can be submitted.

Removed videos need not be graphic. War crimes take many forms. Bombings of hospitals and schools. Mass shellings of cities. Destruction of vital infrastructure, etc.

You'll not see any blood or torn bodies. It will just expose lies of some nation state's propaganda.

These kinds of videos get removed too. Either directly or indirectly by banning the entire account, if it posts more videos that are questionable - which is likely. Or because of targetting by trolls using false complaints.

Though I'm not that worried. Many people already know the perils of YouTube, and archive everything at first sight.

It just serves the nation state's propaganda, that is usually left untouched, because it's served via more official media channels.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#104

Post by v_lisivka » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:44 AM UTC

gdy wrote: post #94

v_lisivka wrote: post #89

Number looks very little, if compared to Russia backing. Russia has whole TV channels backed by FSB, whole troll fabrics, and their own agents even in major Western media. Why few orders of magnitude greater effort cannot help Russia, while much smaller effort helps USA a lot?

"Number looks very little, if compared to Russia backing. Russia has whole TV channels backed by FSB, whole troll fabrics, and their own agents even in major Western media." [Citation needed]

See https://euvsdisinfo.eu/

About EU vs Disinformation campaign

This website is part of a campaign to better forecast, address and respond to pro-Kremlin disinformation. The ‘EU versus Disinformation’ campaign is run by the European External Action Service East Stratcom Task Force. The team was set up after the EU Heads of State and Government stressed the need to challenge Russia’s ongoing disinformation campaigns in March 2015.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#105

Post by v_lisivka » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:49 AM UTC

ben_w wrote: post #95

v_lisivka wrote: post #89

Number looks very little, if compared to Russia backing. Russia has whole TV channels backed by FSB, whole troll fabrics, and their own agents even in major Western media. Why few orders of magnitude greater effort cannot help Russia, while much smaller effort helps USA a lot?

Quantity isn’t always the most important quality. The US (and the UK?) seems to present propaganda as something the bad guys do, which is easier to believe if the changes are limited. Limited doesn’t mean unimportant, and it being limited forces focus on important changes. (I’m not assuming competence here: I assume that’s random over time)

So, you say, Russia seems to counter-present USA propaganda as something the good guys do? It's looks stupid. Maybe I misunderstood you. Can you say explicitly, who does good propaganda, and who does bad propaganda? Who is good and who is bad?

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#106

Post by basetop » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:50 AM UTC

Tech companies are deleting evidence of war crimes and everything else at the behest of media companies like the atlantic.

Youtube, facebook, reddit, google search, etc have all been targeted by the atlantic, nytimes, washingtonpost, cnn, etc and bullied into scrubbing content and direct their users to "authoritative sources". Ironically enough, in china, russia and most countries, "authoritative sources" are state propaganda organs. But we are different or so I'm told. Our "authoritative sources" are independent news organizations who strangely enough push the same message with the same talking points. What a coincidence. For "independent" "news" organizations, they sure are united in the same message.

This censorship has been going on for at least 5 years now. Maybe the atlantic journalists should investigate their editors as to why the atlantic has supported censorship? Or maybe the atlantic journalists should start investigating nytimes, washingtonpost, cnn, etc. Why so many government/intelligence agency people are working in media. Why so many children of politicians ( Bushes, Clintons, McCains, Cuomos, etc ) have prominent positions in the media?

Or is the atlantic only interested in war crime evidence that suit their agenda ( pushing for war in syria, venezuela, etc )?

This article is so weird. It's like an arsonist setting a house on fire and telling everyone that the house is on fire.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#107

Post by toxicFork » Thu, May 09, 2019, 10:52 AM UTC

Digit-Al wrote: post #87

So, here's an idea. Let's take the case of YouTube, instead of its algorithm deleting this content, how about it is marked with a flag. Normal users are completely unable to view, or even know of the existence of content marked with this flag. It doesn't come up in searches and even a direct link will just show some "content unavailable" message. Human rights groups and the like can request permission for a designate…

How do you sell this to YouTube or enforce this on them, to first accept then prioritise this functionality? What benefits do they gain or what alternatives do they avoid, as a company for profit?

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#108

Post by freeflight » Thu, May 09, 2019, 11:02 AM UTC

HNthrow22 wrote: post #70

subjoriented wrote: post #32

The article centers around activity in Syria, but the problem is much more endemic. In the United States, Apple has consistently taken down apps providing information about US government airstrikes - including those that strike wedding processions, children, bystanders, etc. Recent efforts to identify and scrub foreign propagandists in the United States have silenced legitimate voices of domestic dissent, as foreign…

> Reddit is another example a company that has recently scrubbed itself of most controversial content, I agree with you on most points however reddit takes no action against extremists and fringe groups proliferating on their platform until substantial pressure is applied from either advertisers or journalists. They go as far as shadowbanning users who bring up their lack of action to shine a light on their culpabili…

Reddit has banned Russian [0] and Iranian [1] "propaganda accounts", now lots of people over there are calling to ban "Chinese propaganda" [2] aka anybody who gets tired of anti-Chinese submissions constantly being pushed on the front-page.

Gee, one might wonder where that might be coming from? [3] That's the absurdity of the situation: Russian, Iranian and Chinese "propaganda" gets banned, while US propaganda [4] isn't even recognized as such because being pro "democracy, freedom US" is considered the default "good" position and anything not in line with it must be evil or at least bad.

[0] https://www.engadget.com/2019/02/04/russia-spam-account-prob...

[1] https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/reddit-accounts-iranian-infl...

[2] https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/craigsilverman/reddit-c...

[3] https://www.reddit.com/r/Blackout2015/comments/4ylml3/reddit...

[4] https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-op...

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#109

Post by jeandejean » Thu, May 09, 2019, 11:14 AM UTC

Digit-Al wrote: post #87

So, here's an idea. Let's take the case of YouTube, instead of its algorithm deleting this content, how about it is marked with a flag. Normal users are completely unable to view, or even know of the existence of content marked with this flag. It doesn't come up in searches and even a direct link will just show some "content unavailable" message. Human rights groups and the like can request permission for a designate…

Why would Human rights groups be entitled to have this censorship privilege? So they'd decide now what's good or bad to display on Youtube?

If anyone needs evidence, it is Justice prosecutors and it is likely already possible. Deleted from user-facing Youtube and Facebook and the like doesn't mean it's deleted from their storage...

Plus the title is misleading: they're not deleting evidence of war crimes, they're deleting upsetting and distressing videos from their open platform, and that's a good thing! Nothing proves they don't already pass these videos to law enforcement.

Re: Tech Companies Are Deleting Evidence of War Crimes

#110

Post by candiodari » Thu, May 09, 2019, 11:22 AM UTC

basetop wrote: post #106

Tech companies are deleting evidence of war crimes and everything else at the behest of media companies like the atlantic. Youtube, facebook, reddit, google search, etc have all been targeted by the atlantic, nytimes, washingtonpost, cnn, etc and bullied into scrubbing content and direct their users to "authoritative sources". Ironically enough, in china, russia and most countries, "authoritative sources" are state p…

> Tech companies are deleting evidence of war crimes and everything else at the behest of media companies like the atlantic.

Don't underestimate governments forcing these companies to hide evidence of their own misdeeds.

Even governments that you wouldn't traditionally think of as abusive. Take for yourself what a realistic number is for police abuse and then how much gets filmed and uploaded. Then search on Youtube. Clearly, someone's asking for removals in the US. Same for Europe. I doubt very much it's the Atlantic doing that.