Facebook Executives In Chicago To Discuss Plan To Remove Violent Posts
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Facebook executives met with Chicago community activists on Thursday, to discuss the company's efforts to make its social media website safer for everyone.
Representatives from Facebook were at Operation PUSH headquarters in Kenwood to meet with Rev. Jesse Jackson, Cook County Commissioner Richard Boykin, and other civic leaders.
Last month, Jackson called on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to impose a 30-day moratorium on Facebook Live, arguing the company need to find a way to stop people from posting violent and vile videos online, such as the live stream of Antonio Perkins being shot and killed last summer.
Zuckerberg has announced plans to hire 3,000 additional people to review posts to the site, joining 4,500 people already on staff.
"These reviewers will also help us get better at removing things we don't allow on Facebook like hate speech and child exploitation. And we'll keep working with local community groups and law enforcement who are in the best position to help someone if they need it -- either because they're about to harm themselves, or because they're in danger from someone else," Zuckerberg posted on Facebook.
Jackson applauded the hiring announcement as an important first step.
"If you're doing Facebook Live and a song is playing in the back, they can cut it immediately for copyright. We want the same thing to happen for a human right; for the right to live, the right to be free of murder, the right to be free of rape," he said.
Zuckerberg has promised Facebook will make it simpler for users to report problems, so the company can respond faster. However, some critics said, for a company worth billions of dollars, hiring a few thousand workers isn't enough.
Cybersecurity expert Bill Kresse of Governors State University says Facebook has 2 billion users for the relative handful of monitors to watch.
"That's one monitor for every 267,000 users, or, to put it in perspective, that would be like the city of Orlando, Florida having a police force of one."
