{"id":15817,"date":"2019-03-23T02:42:42","date_gmt":"2019-03-23T02:42:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=15817"},"modified":"2019-03-24T13:17:41","modified_gmt":"2019-03-24T13:17:41","slug":"livestreamed-massacre-means-its-time-to-shut-down-facebook-live","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/livestreamed-massacre-means-its-time-to-shut-down-facebook-live\/","title":{"rendered":"Livestreamed massacre means it’s time to shut down Facebook Live"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jennifer Grygiel<\/a>, Syracuse University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

When word broke that the massacre in New Zealand was livestreamed on Facebook, I immediately thought of Robert Godwin Sr.<\/a> In 2017, Godwin was murdered in Cleveland, Ohio, and initial reports indicated that the attacker streamed it on Facebook Live, at the time a relatively new feature<\/a> of the social network. Facebook later clarified that the graphic video was uploaded after the event<\/a>, but the incident called public attention to the risks of livestreaming violence.<\/p>\n

In the wake of Godwin\u2019s murder, I recommended that Facebook Live broadcasts be time-delayed<\/a>, at least for Facebook users who had told the company they were under 18. That way, adult users would have an opportunity to flag inappropriate content before children were exposed to it. Facebook Live has broadcast killings<\/a>, as well as other serious crimes such as sexual assault, torture and child abuse<\/a>. Though the company has hired more than 3,000 additional human content moderators<\/a>, Facebook is not any better at keeping horrifying violence from streaming live online without any filter or warning for users.<\/p>\n

In the 24 hours after the New Zealand massacre, 1.5 million videos and images of the killings<\/a> were uploaded to Facebook\u2019s servers, the company announced. Facebook highlighted the fact that 1.2 million of them \u201cwere blocked at upload<\/a>.\u201d However, as a social media researcher and educator<\/a>, I heard that as an admission that 300,000 videos and images of a mass murder passed through its automated systems and were visible on the platform.<\/p>\n

The company recently issued some analytic details and noted that fewer than 200 people viewed<\/a> the livestream of the massacre, and that surprisingly, no users reported it to Facebook until after it ended. These details make painfully clear how dependent Facebook is on users to flag harmful content. They also suggest that people don\u2019t know how to report inappropriate content \u2013 or don\u2019t have confidence the company will act on the complaint.<\/p>\n

The video that remained after the livestream ended was viewed nearly 4,000 times \u2013 which doesn\u2019t include copies of the video<\/a> uploaded to other sites and to Facebook by other users. It\u2019s unclear how many of the people who saw it were minors; youth as young as 13 are allowed to set up Facebook accounts and could have encountered unfiltered footage of murderous hatred. It\u2019s past time for the company to step up and fulfill the promise its founder and CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, made two years ago, after Godwin\u2019s murder: \u201cWe will keep doing all we can to prevent tragedies like this from happening<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n