Meta is preparing a new anti-terrorist tool. The news comes as the company will become chair of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) Operating Council next month.
GIFCT was founded by Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube in 2017 and has since become a non-governmental organization (NGO) to counter terrorism and violent extremist content online.
The company says it has the tool Hasher-Matcher-Actioner (HMA) which will be free for companies willing to adopt it to combat the spread of terrorist content online. The news comes as Meta is committed to increasing content moderation on its platform.
“Meta's commitment to tackling terrorist content is part of a broader approach to protecting users from harmful content on our services. We are pioneers in the development of AI technology to remove hate content at scale,” said Meta's President of Global Affairs, Nick Clegg in a press release.
He continued, “We've learned over the years that if you run a business social networking at scale, you should create rules and procedures that are as transparent and enforceable as possible."
The HMA will build on a precedent software Meta's open source video display and mapping and will be usable against any type of content that violates company policies. Ideally, the tool will be able to quickly remove dangerous content, if needed, from multiple platforms.
HMA will use hashes or digital fingerprints to find duplicate images, making it easier for companies to monitor and remove terrorist-related content.
Meta's HMA will be a free, open-source content control tool "that will help platforms spot duplicate images or videos and take action against them en masse," Clegg said.
Meta said it spent $5 billion on security measures last year and has more than 40.000 employees working in this area. The company also said it has hundreds of employees in this group who have experience in law enforcement, national security, counter-terrorism intelligence and academic studies in radicalization. Everyone is working to strengthen online security.
Dina Hussein, Head of Counter-Terrorism and Dangerous Organizations Policy at Meta, Reported to ABC News that sharing Meta's Hasher-Matcher-Actioner tool with other platforms will benefit Internet platforms the most. "What we're hoping to do is improve our core best practices for the entire industry," Hussein said.
“As long as this kind of content exists in the world, it will appear online. And only through a collective collaboration can we really remove it."
Meta and GIFCT will release HMA to companies starting in January.
