Facebook’s parent company, Meta, is studying whether its platforms treat users differently based on race.
KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV / AFP via Getty Images
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KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV / AFP via Getty Images
Facebook’s parent company, Meta, is studying whether its platforms treat users differently based on race.
KIRILL KUDRYAVTSEV / AFP via Getty Images
The parent company of Facebook and Instagram is looking into whether their platforms treat users differently based on race, after years of criticism, especially from Black users and themselves. workers about racial prejudice.
Roy Austin Jr., vice president of civil rights at Meta, formerly known as Facebook, said: “There are a lot of members of communities that are marginalized and historically feel that the experience of they on our platform are different.
That includes Black user people who say their posts about racism have been taken down for company violations hate speech rule. Facebook also apologized in September after a mistake in artificial intelligence software led to a video of Black men being labeled as “primates”.
Meta is starting out by tracking the users of its platform, which Austin describes as “a huge step forward in moving from anecdotal to data-driven.” This work will allow the company to understand how people’s experiences on Facebook can vary by race, he said, a first step toward addressing any issues.
“Until we do this kind of data collection, we can’t really answer that question one way or another,” he said.
The challenge for the company is to collect demographic information in a way that doesn’t violate user privacy. Meta has released a paper details how it plans to combine estimates based on people’s ZIP codes and last names with surveys in which people identify their race or ethnicity.
The announcement was made as Meta released an update on its response to civil rights audit the company mandated following widespread accusations that its products encourage discrimination.
The 2020 report, which came after a two-year investigation by independent auditors, criticized the company for putting freedom of expression above other values, a decision the auditors said. that undermined the company’s efforts to curb hate speech and voter suppression.
The auditors said the company had made “upsetting and heartbreaking decisions,” including refusing to remove then-President Donald Trump’s posts in “a clear violation” of its policies. company on hate speech, violence and voter suppression; exempt politicians from third-party fact-checking; and “too reluctant to apply strong rules to restrict [voting] disinformation and voter suppression. “
Meta hired Austin, a veteran civil rights lawyer who had worked at the Justice Department during the Obama administration, in January responding to the audit. In an update on Thursday, the company said it had implemented more than half of its auditor’s recommendations, from hiring more civil rights staff to updating content moderation and advertisement and is doing or evaluating much of the rest.
Austin told NPR that the biggest change Meta has made is the creation of the 10-person civil rights group he leads.
“I was able to hire a team of people who know and understand civil rights law, know and understand voting and citizen participation, know and understand products, know and understand artificial intelligence, know and understand law enforcement and hate speech,” he said. “It’s incredibly important to have those voices in the room we’re in.”
He says his team is providing input on the decisions Meta makes and the products Meta builds.
But outside groups that have long criticized the company’s record on citizenship and discrimination say Meta is still falling short.
“We recognize [Roy Austin]Facebook’s leadership and the goals of the Facebook Civil Rights Team. However, this progress report is simply not enough,” said the Anti-Defamation League, part of the coalition that organized a boycott of Facebook for hate speech last year, tweeted on Thursday. “Ultimately, we need to see real transparency and a credible independent expert review.”
ADL pointed to documents disclosed by whistleblower Frances Haugen shows that Facebook has been unable to take down hate speech, even though such posts violate its rules. And the company says it should hire more employees focused on civil rights, especially because it shift its focus to build a new immersive virtual platform called reverse.
“Of Facebook [60,000] employees, less than 10 in the Civil Rights Team. Facebook must put civil rights expertise to EVERY group, including those building the Metaverse,” ADL tweeted. If Facebook is trying to build credibility, this clearly misses the mark”.
Editor’s Note: Meta pays NPR to license NPR content.
