Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, and YouTube Creating Database Of 'Terrorist Content'?

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Forming somewhat a conglomerate, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and Microsoft has taken a step ahead towards safeguarding people on the Internet. In order to curb "Terrorist Content" and "Terrorism", the conglomerate formed on a mutual understanding who will create a database that will identify images via unique digital fingerprint and then it will help remove the flagged content from the servers altogether.

The Verge posted an article reporting the happening and some extracts from a joint blog post led by Twitter, YouTube, Microsoft, and Facebook. In the following blog post, it is clearly mentioned that there is no place from terrorism provoking content on these four platforms. If such content is found on any platform and if it violates their respective policies will result in legal actions against the culprit thereby discouraging anyone to repeat it. Using a similar identification technique, this conglomerate works towards eliminating any content about child pornography and exactly one year later, a similar technique will deploy to eliminate terrorism provoking content on a hefty scale.

TechCrunch explains the working of the model. The model works by assigning hashed identification number to each flagged video or image which will undergo through computer algorithms which will then get posted on a shared database. This will help identify the respective image or video and remove it from being available from servers that could potentially provoke terrorism in any form. The shared database will help identify the contents through hashed values that the companies will review and if the content is found to breaching policies, it will get deleted and probing into the matter will begin.

The flipside of the model is the detection and execution process is slow. Nowadays when photos and videos go viral at any given instances, it could be possible that the flagged image or video has already circulated and that will make things little weird. Over the past few years, there have been many instances where the social networks were deeply criticized due to slow process towards hate speech or propaganda and towards ISIS extremists.

Although Facebook said that it will never store personal information about the account from where the post came, it is no secret that government can use legal tactics and dig into the origin of the post. However, there is no information that how Facebook will potentially handle requests. If any videos or images are found available on platforms then the companies will be held accountable so as to why they allowed the content on their platforms.