March 29, 2024
Facebook readying 'break-glass' tools to restrict content if violence erupts after election
WASHINGTON - Facebook executives said Tuesday the social media company is ready to implement "break-glass measures" to restrict content on its platforms if civil unrest and violence erupt following the Nov. 3 presidential election.

The preparations come as Facebook has taken more aggressive steps ahead of the 2020 election to limit disinformation on the social network than in 2016, when Russian operatives sought to further inflame tensions over hot-button topics such as race and immigration.

Nick Clegg, Facebook's head of global affairs, told USA TODAY the company has engaged in meticulous "scenario-planning" on election outcomes that range from "benign scenarios to some extremely worrying ones." He said Facebook has used knowledge gleaned from 200 elections around the world in the last four years to crack down on election interference and misinformation.

"We have developed break-glass tools which do allow us to, if for a temporary period of time, effectively throw a blanket over a lot of content that would freely circulate on our platforms," Clegg said, "in order to play our role as responsible as we can to prevent that content, wittingly or otherwise, from aiding and abetting those who want to continue with the violence and civil strife that we're seeing on the ground."

He added: "We very much hope we won't have to. And it would have to be a highly worrisome and abnormal situation to do so."

Clegg declined to discuss what the measures might look like because he said it wouldn't be helpful to "elicit a greater sense of anxiety than we hope will be warranted."

He said Facebook deployed "break-glass measures" during recent elections in other countries, singling out last year's India election in which he said Facebook moved quickly to "aggressively limit" the number of messages a user could forward. He said the company has turned to the tools when "the situation on the ground is spiraling into a chaotic and violent form of civil strife."

Stoking fears of a contested U.S. election, President Donald Trump has warned repeatedly the November election will be the "greatest election disaster in history." The president has accused Democrats of seeking to rig the election through mail-in ballots, which he's slammed without evidence as being more fraudulent than voting in person. Trump has complained about the weeks it might take election officials to count all absentee ballots, and he's not been clear whether he would accept election results.

A study from the Democracy Fund Voter Study Group found nearly 1 out of 4 voters, 22% of Democrats and 21% of Republicans, said some amount of "violence" would be justified if the candidate they oppose wins the White House.

After the election, Facebook says it will crack down on any attempt by candidates to claim false victories or delegitimize the results by directing users to accurate information on the election results.

FBI Director Chris Wray told lawmakers last week that Russia remains "very active" in its effort to disrupt the vote, primarily by denigrating Democratic nominee Joe Biden. Four years ago, Russia waged similar efforts to hurt Democrat Hillary Clinton and help Trump.

Gleicher said Facebook has identified 100 networks of "coordinated, inauthenticated behavior" designed to deceive voters in the past three-plus years, information that the company makes publicly available. He said Facebook has identified four separate networks in the past six months linked to Russian actors.

"There are no guarantees in security," Gleicher said. "That's very important to say. But all the patterns that we are seeing, all the evidence we're seeing, is we are catching them much faster and it's much, much harder for them than it used to be."

Facebook has been less aggressive in policing social media posts from the president than Twitter, which has flagged tweets for being factually inaccurate or glorifying violence. That posture has set off a firestorm of criticism inside and outside the company, but founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg has held firm in his statements that Facebook is a free speech zone and that the public needs to see newsworthy posts from political candidates. (Source: USA Today)
Story Date: September 24, 2020
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