Facebook on Wednesday said it will hire 3,000 more employees to monitor crime-related content and posts it finds objectionable on the website. Its announcement follows several cases of users posting murder videos live on its site. The recruits will be hired in addition to the existing 4,500 employees the social media giant has already assigned with similar duties.
In a post, the platform’s chief executive officer, Mark Zuckerberg, said, “If we are going to build a safe community, we need to respond quickly. We are working to make these videos easier to report so we can take the right action sooner.”
The website has been rebuked for not having appropriate mechanisms to block videos, including the Cleveland murder and the killing of a baby in Thailand. While Facebook’s policy has publicly prohibited and condemned violent posts, the content can only be removed if reported.
The company faces the challenge of drawing the line between allowing news reports and content that condemn violence.
On April 26, Facebook had removed two disturbing videos from its platforms – one of a 21-year-old man in Thailand murdering his 11-month-old daughter and the other of his own suicide. On April 3, a 23-year-old student in Mumbai streamed a Facebook live video outlining how to commit suicide before jumping off the 19th floor of Taj Lands End hotel.
In a separate incident, a Swedish court had sentenced three men to jail for live-streaming the gangrape of a woman in Uppsala earlier this year.
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