New tech helps Facebook remove 99% of IS posts before users flag it up

Facebook claims it is making significant advances in the fight against online extremism.

The tech giant has revealed that 99% of all Islamic State and al Qaeda-related content is being removed from their platform before users flag it up.

In a review of its counter-extremism efforts, Facebook executives acknowledge there is more to do, but the company said it was actively investing in the latest advances in artificial intelligence (AI) systems to help identify and take down extremist content more quickly.
The UK Government said it welcomed the progress Facebook has made, but added all technology companies had further to go in tackling online extremism.
Facebook has also revealed that 83% of Islamic State and al Qaeda content posted on its platform was identified and removed within an hour.
In a special blog ahead of the EU Counter Terrorism Forum on 6 December, Facebook executives Monika Bickert and Brian Fishman detailed the efforts their company was making.
They wrote: "We invest in efforts to prevent terrorist content from ever hitting our site. But when it does, we are working to quickly find it and remove it from our platform.
"We've historically relied on people, our content reviewers to assess potentially violating content and remove it.
"But we've begun to use artificial intelligence to supplement these efforts, in order to more quickly and accurately identify terrorist content.
"In figuring out what's effective, we face the challenges that any company faces in developing technology that can work across different types of media and different types of content.
"For instance, a solution that works for photos will not necessarily help with videos or text.
"A solution that works for recognising terrorist iconography in images will not necessarily distinguish between a terrorist sharing that image to recruit and a news organisation sharing the same image to educate the public."
Although Islamic State is coming under extreme pressure from coalition forces, its members and supporters are continuing to pump out massive amounts of extremist material - propaganda that finds its way across towns and cities and into ordinary homes, through the internet and social media sites.