Of course. They’re too busy hunting for “right-wing extremists” and foes of jihad violence and Sharia oppression of women.
“Facebook fails to catch East Africa extremist content, study finds,” Associated Press, June 15, 2022:
NAIROBI, Kenya — A new study has found that Facebook has failed to catch Islamic State group and al-Shabab extremist content in posts aimed at East Africa as the region remains under threat from violent attacks and Kenya prepares to vote in a closely contested national election.
An Associated Press series last year, drawing on leaked documents shared by a Facebook whistleblower, showed how the platform repeatedly failed to act on sensitive content including hate speech in many places around the world.
The new and unrelated two-year study by the Institute for Strategic Dialogue found Facebook posts that openly supported IS or the Somalia-based al-Shabab — even ones carrying al-Shabab branding and calling for violence in languages including Swahili, Somali and Arabic — were allowed to be widely shared.
The report expresses particular concern with narratives linked to the extremist groups that accuse Kenyan government officials and politicians of being enemies of Muslims, who make up a significant part of the East African nation’s population. The report notes that “xenophobia toward Somali communities in Kenya has long been rife.”
The al-Qaida-linked al-Shabab has been described as the deadliest extremist group in Africa, and it has carried out high-profile attacks in recent years in Kenya far from its base in neighboring Somalia….
The Institute for Strategic Dialogue found 445 public profiles, some with duplicate accounts, sharing content linked to the two extremist groups and tagging more than 17,000 other accounts. Among the narratives shared were accusations that Kenya and the United States are enemies of Islam, and among the posted content was praise by al-Shabab’s official media arm for the killing of Kenyan soldiers.
Even when Facebook took down pages, they would quickly be reconstituted under different names, Ayad said, describing serious lapses by both artificial intelligence and human moderators.
“Why are they not acting on rampant content put up by al-Shabab?” he asked. “You’d think that after 20 years of dealing with al-Qaida, they’d have a good understanding of the language they use, the symbolism.”
He said the authors have discussed their findings with Facebook and some of the accounts have been taken down. He said the authors also plan to share the findings with Kenya’s government.
Ayad said both civil society and government bodies such as Kenya’s national counterterrorism center should be aware of the problem and encourage Facebook to do more.
Asked for comment, Facebook requested a copy of the report before its publication, which was refused.
The company then responded with an emailed statement.
“We’ve already removed a number of these pages and profiles and will continue to investigate once we have access to the full findings,” Facebook wrote Tuesday, not giving any name, citing security concerns. “We don’t allow terrorist groups to use Facebook, and we remove content praising or supporting these organizations when we become aware of it. We have specialized teams — which include native Arabic, Somali and Swahili speakers — dedicated to this effort.”…
gravenimage says
Facebook fails to catch jihadist posts from the Islamic State and al-Shabab aimed at East Africa
Of course. They’re too busy hunting for “right-wing extremists” and foes of jihad violence and Sharia oppression of women.
…………………………………
*So true*. And most of this Jihad content would be pretty easy to catch if they actually wanted to–threats of violence and stylized Islamic phrasing. Sure, a few posts would likely sneak through even if they were careful, but nothing like this.
raja says
Gravenimage,
Sure, Some calls for murder or other schemes can escape the prying eyes of FB. But FB is just useless as its focus is just aligned to propping up radical Left and Islamists. When you can’t even know the enemy how can you do what’s right?
gravenimage says
Too true, Raja. doubt that FB much cares about Jihad calls for violence.
gregbeetham says
“We have specialized teams — which include native Arabic, Somali and Swahili speakers — dedicated to this effort.”…
So, basically Facebook hire Muslims to monitor Islamic hate speech. YouTube is the same, Muslims are a protected goup in both places. The mystery is why?
Bobby says
You hit the mail on the head sir.
gravenimage says
So true, Greg.