The B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission (ADC), Australia’s leading organisation fighting anti-Semitism and hatred in all its forms, has welcomed the initiatives taken by online giants Google, Facebook, Microsoft, YouTube and Twitter to remove hateful content. Google announced that it has changed autocomplete suggestions in its search engine to remove anti-Semitic, racist and sexist entries. In a separate development, Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube have formed a partnership to combat the proliferation of terrorist materials which will see the establishment of a shared database to identify “fingerprints” of prohibited images and videos.
Dr Dvir Abramovich, Chairman of the ADC, issued the following statement:
“The escalation of cyber-hatred and extremist websites that flows unchallenged is a cause of increasing concern for the ADC, and so it is encouraging to see that the giants of the internet are co-operating and stepping up their efforts to further curb the proliferation of anti-Semitism, radicalism and racism. White-supremacist movements, terrorist groups and individuals are increasingly manipulating and hijacking the powerful medium of social media to extend their reach and transmit their malicious ideologies so as to incite and to recruit members. We trust that these leading companies, have a moral obligation to protect users, will continue to aggressively clamp down on terrorist-related activities and to shut down the accounts of violent extremists, as well as devote more resources to confront the highly troubling growth of digital bigotry. The ADC welcomes these very promising actions and hopes that these key stakeholders will keep developing new technologies and strategies to counter this ever-burgeoning threat.”
The B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission, founded in 1979, is Australia’s leading civil rights organization fighting racism through educational programs that combat bigotry, prejudice and all forms of hatred.
For further information please contact Dr Dvir Abramovich on (03) 9272 5677.