Facebook Tests New Ways to Prevent Sharing of Content That Victimizes Children

Facebook is testing new tools aimed at preventing people from sharing content that victimizes children, as well as improvements to its detection and reporting tools. People on the flagship Facebook application who search for terms associated with child exploitation will see a popup that warns them of the consequences of viewing illegal content and suggests ways to receive help from offender diversion organizations. And in cases where people share viral, meme child exploitative content, the content is removed, banked and reported to the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children. Those users will also see a safety alert informing them about the harm that sharing content of this type can cause and warning that it is against the social network’s policies and there are legal consequences. Accounts that promote content of this sort will be removed, and global head of safety Antigone Davis wrote in a Newsroom post Tuesday, “We are using insights from this safety alert to help us identify behavioral signals of those who might be at risk of sharing this material, so that we can also educate them on why it is harmful and encourage them not to share it on any surface—public or private.” She added that Facebook has expanded its detection technology to sniff out and remove network that violate its child exploitation policies, mirroring its efforts to combat coordinated inauthentic behavior and dangerous organizations, and the social network’s child safety policies have been updated to clarify that profiles, pages, group and Instagram accounts dedicated to sharing “otherwise innocent images of children with captions, hashtags or comments containing inappropriate signs of affection or commentary about the children depicted in the image” will be removed. Davis wrote, “We’ve always removed content that explicitly sexualizes children, but content that isn’t explicit and doesn’t depict child nudity is harder to define. Under this new policy, while the images alone may not break our rules, the accompanying text can help us better determine whether the content is sexualizing children and if the associated profile, page, group or account should be removed.” Facebook made it easier for users to report content for violating its child exploitation policies by adding the option to choose “involves a child” under the “Nudity and Sexual Activity” category, following consultations with child safety experts and organizations. Davis said these reports will be prioritized for review, adding that the social network is now using Google’s Content Safety API (application-programming interface) to better prioritize content for its reviewers. She wrote that Facebook conducted an in-depth analysis of content it reported to NCMEC last October and November, finding that over 90% was the same or visually similar to previously reported content, and adding that copies of just six videos made up over one-half of content it reported during that period. Davis added, “While this data indicates that the number of pieces of content does not equal the number of victims, and that the same content, potentially slightly altered, is being shared repeatedly, one victim of this horrible crime is one too many.” She concluded, “Using our apps to harm children is abhorrent and unacceptable. Our industry-leading efforts to combat child exploitation focus on preventing abuse, detecting and reporting content that violates our policies and working with experts and authorities to keep children safe.”