Meta says it engaged ‘quickly’ with eSafety over stabbing content
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The news: Meta says that it acted promptly to engage with the eSafety Commissioner after the company was issued with a “class 1” removal notice for violent content related to the Wakeley stabbing in Sydney last week.
The context: In a blog post on Tuesday, Meta’s policy team in Australia outlined steps it took to “protect the community from harmful content” related to recent stabbings at Sydney’s Bondi Junction Westfield, and another at Christ The Good Shepherd Church in Wakeley days later.
Meta and Elon Musk’s X Corp each received removal notices from the online safety watchdog for violent content related to the Wakeley stabbing in Sydney last week. The eSafety Commissioner on 17 April said it was satisfied with the steps Facebook and Instagram parent Meta had taken to comply, while X Corp said it would challenge the notice in court.
The Federal Court on Monday night granted the eSafety Commissioner an emergency injunction to force the social media platform to remove videos of last week’s Sydney terrorist attack.
What they said: “When we received the ‘class 1 removal notice’ from the eSafety Commissioner in relation to the Wakeley attack, we quickly responded to confirm that we had already been taking action in relation to the content that was the subject of the Notice,” Meta said in the blog post.
“We designated the Bondi Junction attack as multiple victim violence and the Wakeley attack as terrorism (the latter following the NSW Police Commissioner’s declaration of such), which under our policies means that in both cases we could act to remove the perpetrator’s accounts and any glorification or praise and support of the attackers or attacks.
“We identified the victims and law enforcement involved in the Bondi attacks and proactively monitored for any abusive content or content that would breach our bullying and harassment policies.”
The source: Meta
