With Facebook’s ‘Reporting Guide,’ a Step in the Right Direction
We are living in an era where transparency — be it from government, corporations, or individuals — has come to be expected. As such, social media platforms have come under scrutiny in recent years for their policies around content moderation, but perhaps none have received as much criticism as Facebook.
The platform, which boasts 900 million users worldwide, has been the object of ire by LGBT rights advocates, Palestinian activists and others for its seemingly arbitrary methods of content moderation. The platform’s policies are fairly clear, but the manner by which its staff chooses to either keep or delete content from the site has long seemed murky — until now.
Recently, Facebook posted an elaborate flow chart dubbed its “Reporting Guide,” demonstrating what happens when content is reported by a user. For example, if a Facebook user reports another user’s content as spam, the content is referred (or “escalated”) to Facebook’s Abusive Content Team, whereas harassment is referred to the Hate and Harassment Team. There are also protocols for referring certain content to law enforcement, and for warning a user or deleting his or her account.
Facebook should be commended for lending transparency to a process that has long come under criticism for its seeming arbitrariness. Such transparency is imperative to help users understand when their behavior is genuinely in violation of the site’s policies; for example, several activists have reported receiving warnings after adding too many new “friends” too quickly, a result of a sensitive spam-recognition algorithm. Awareness of that fact could help users modify their behavior so as to avoid account suspension.