Google and Facebook were grilled this week and put in a passive position as questions were raised about their role in the storming of the U.S. Capitol on the 6th.
The protesters who stormed the Capitol used Google’s YouTube, Facebook and other platforms before and during the storming.
Pressed on whether Google parent company Alphabet ignored the extent of the danger, Alphabet and Google CEO Sundar Pichai said the company had been concerned about the “potential for real-world harm” and “incitement to violence.
“I don’t want to say that we clearly foresaw what happened last week, but the potential for violence is a concern. Prior to this (the events of last week), there was intelligence on this.” Pichai said this week at the Reuters Next conference.
“I think the Internet as a whole needs to come to grips with the kind of information that can be disseminated. There’s definitely more to be done on all sides of us.” He added.
In the weeks following the 2020 U.S. election, YouTube removed thousands of videos alleging “widespread election fraud” and suspended President Trump‘s channel after the storming of the U.S. Capitol, accusing him of “inciting violence.
Google also removed Parler, a social media App popular with Trump supporters, from its GooglePlay store.
Gab, another social media outlet popular with conservatives, half-jokingly called for Facebook and Twitter to be removed from the online store as well, citing rumors. These rumors refer to the fact that the storming of Congress was organized on Twitter, while the 6th protest was organized on Facebook.
On Friday (15), the Twitter account of at least one of the people charged in connection with the storming of Congress remained active.
Parler’s CEO told the Epoch Times this week that the companies that deplatformed Parler are demanding that it follow different standards than Facebook and Twitter. He also denounced those who use Parler to engage in violence.
Twitter did not return a request for comment. Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook’s chief operating officer, said in an interview broadcast during the Reuters conference that the storming of Congress was organized online but blamed on other platforms.
“We know it was organized online. We know that we blocked the accounts of ‘QAnon’ (Anonymous), ‘Proud Boys’ (Proud Boys), shut down the ‘Stop Stealing Elections’ group again — any group that talked about the violence that may have occurred last week. Our enforcement of the rules is never perfect, so I’m sure there are still (such) things going on on Facebook. But I think that most of these events are organized on (other) platforms. They don’t have the ability to stop the hate, the standards that we have, or the transparency that we have.” She said.
Facebook announced Monday (11) that it was removing all content containing the phrase “stop stealing elections” ahead of Biden’s swearing-in day on the 20th.
A Facebook spokesperson told reporters on Twitter, “Shirley noted that these events were organized online, including on our platform, and she took the lead in making it clear that we played a role (in it).”
The spokesperson added, “She pointed this out, as did many journalists and academics: our crackdown on ‘Anonymous Q,’ militias and hate groups has meant that a great deal of activity has moved to other platforms (for organizing) where rules and enforcement are less work. “
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