Facebook admits industry could do more to combat online extremism

Facebook has conceded that technology companies could do more to counter online extremism after Theresa May and the French president, Emmanuel Macron, proposed fining firms that move too slowly to remove extremist content being shared by terrorist groups. The social media giant told a meeting between political leaders and its own executives as well as others from Google and Microsoft at the United Nations general assembly in New York that it is now employing thousands of content reviewers around the globe and a staff of 150 people dedicated to countering terrorism on its platform in a bid to remove more extremist content. But, along with Google, it warned that using emerging artificial intelligence technologies to spot dangerous material was not yet foolproof. Facebook sources said the company accepted the industry could do more and said it was committed to building more technology to help address these issues. But it said it was already accelerating its efforts, in particular by using artificial intelligence to flag up extremist content and sharing this data with rival firms.