One of Facebook’s leading voices in the Middle East has said it needs governments to get behind a movement to stop the spread of online hate speech.
Dr Erin Marie Saltman, the company's policy manager for Counterterrorism in Europe, Middle East and Africa, made her plea during her demonstration at the World Government Summit in Dubai, earlier today.
She said that it was no longer enough to simply crack down on posts connected to hate speech as censorship tended to have the opposite effect than was intended, causing the message to proliferate.
Dr Saltman said that agencies from all over the world are having to move quickly to combat the constantly evolving problems created by online hate speech.
“If you had told me five years ago that I would be working for a social media company I would have laughed,” she said.
“These jobs simply didn’t exist back then. We are having to build a whole new realm of positions to tackle extremism.”
Facebook came in for major criticism last year after social media users in Myanmar used the platform to organise attacks against the Rohingya, the Muslim minority in a predominantly Buddhist country.
This led to Facebook creating a designated team to handle all content to Myanmar.
“The ethnic violence in Myanmar is horrific and we have been too slow to prevent misinformation and hate on Facebook,” said Facebook Product Manager Sara Su, speaking at the time.“We can’t do it alone — we need help from civil society, other technology companies, journalists, schools, government, and most important of all members of our community.”
In 2018 alone, Facebook removed 14.3 million pieces of content that were identified as terrorist content.
The battle against online extremism became so complicated that Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and Microsoft came together to form the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism in 2017.
The body was set up to “substantially disrupt terrorists' ability to promote terrorism, disseminate violent extremist propaganda, and exploit or glorify real-world acts of violence using our platforms”.
Facebook employs more than 200 people globally who work specifically on countering terrorism. This included policy and operations teams as well as experts on law enforcement, engineering and human rights.
Dr Saltman added that the organisation also employed 30,000 people in its security team to review and respond to harmful content, including hate speech and incitement.
“We are looking at what is causing people to join violent extremist groups,” said Dr Saltman.
“That is the same whether it’s a Neo Nazi white supremacy group, a Buddhist extremist group that might be targeting minorities in south East Asia or Islamist extremism in another part of the world.”
She said that the 30,000 people in the security team were carefully selected to be able to deal with content that was specific to certain regions.
Slang in hate speech is very nuanced, we need a good understand of what's being said
“They have to be based in different time zones. Not only do they have to speak a language, they have to speak it very fluently,” she said.
“For example, I think my French is good, but I shouldn’t be the one reviewing French content in detail.”
She said there were major issues when it came to the nuance of certain cultures.
“Slang in hate speech and cultural context is very nuanced, we need a very good understanding of what’s being said,” she said.
“That’s especially the case when it comes to the differences between humour, sarcasm and offensive speech.”
Another measure that Facebook had taken was tagging certain content by “hashing”, which involved creating a digital fingerprint in each case.
“Anytime that content is shared or reshared – we can immediately identify a match, our technology can make the decision to take it down in some instances,” said Dr Saltman.
She said that when there is context shared, within an image, it becomes the responsibility of a human team with language skills to make a decision on what to do with the content.
“You do see other sectors sharing content for different reasons – you see media sectors sharing it as well as academics,” she said.
“We also see activists that might share an image just to condemn it.”
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How they line up for Sunday's Australian Grand Prix
1 Lewis Hamilton, Mercedes
2 Kimi Raikkonen, Ferrari
3 Sebastian Vettel, Ferrari
4 Max Verstappen, Red Bull
5 Kevin Magnussen, Haas
6 Romain Grosjean, Haas
7 Nico Hulkenberg, Renault
*8 Daniel Ricciardo, Red Bull
9 Carlos Sainz, Renault
10 Valtteri Bottas, Mercedes
11 Fernando Alonso, McLaren
12 Stoffel Vandoorne, McLaren
13 Sergio Perez, Force India
14 Lance Stroll, Williams
15 Esteban Ocon, Force India
16 Brendon Hartley, Toro Rosso
17 Marcus Ericsson, Sauber
18 Charles Leclerc, Sauber
19 Sergey Sirotkin, Williams
20 Pierre Gasly, Toro Rosso
* Daniel Ricciardo qualified fifth but had a three-place grid penalty for speeding in red flag conditions during practice
UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Dhadak 2
Director: Shazia Iqbal
Starring: Siddhant Chaturvedi, Triptii Dimri
Rating: 1/5
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How much do leading UAE’s UK curriculum schools charge for Year 6?
- Nord Anglia International School (Dubai) – Dh85,032
- Kings School Al Barsha (Dubai) – Dh71,905
- Brighton College Abu Dhabi - Dh68,560
- Jumeirah English Speaking School (Dubai) – Dh59,728
- Gems Wellington International School – Dubai Branch – Dh58,488
- The British School Al Khubairat (Abu Dhabi) - Dh54,170
- Dubai English Speaking School – Dh51,269
*Annual tuition fees covering the 2024/2025 academic year
What the law says
Micro-retirement is not a recognised concept or employment status under Federal Decree Law No. 33 of 2021 on the Regulation of Labour Relations (as amended) (UAE Labour Law). As such, it reflects a voluntary work-life balance practice, rather than a recognised legal employment category, according to Dilini Loku, senior associate for law firm Gateley Middle East.
“Some companies may offer formal sabbatical policies or career break programmes; however, beyond such arrangements, there is no automatic right or statutory entitlement to extended breaks,” she explains.
“Any leave taken beyond statutory entitlements, such as annual leave, is typically regarded as unpaid leave in accordance with Article 33 of the UAE Labour Law. While employees may legally take unpaid leave, such requests are subject to the employer’s discretion and require approval.”
If an employee resigns to pursue micro-retirement, the employment contract is terminated, and the employer is under no legal obligation to rehire the employee in the future unless specific contractual agreements are in place (such as return-to-work arrangements), which are generally uncommon, Ms Loku adds.
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Bharatanatyam
A ancient classical dance from the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Intricate footwork and expressions are used to denote spiritual stories and ideas.
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Dubai Bling season three
Cast: Loujain Adada, Zeina Khoury, Farhana Bodi, Ebraheem Al Samadi, Mona Kattan, and couples Safa & Fahad Siddiqui and DJ Bliss & Danya Mohammed
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