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European Commission vice president backs Twitter
in Trump battle
‘This is not about censorship. This is about flagging
verifiably false or misleading information that may cause public harm,’ Věra
Jourová says.
By LAURA
KAYALI 6/1/20, 2:51 PM CET Updated 6/2/20, 10:41 PM CET
European
Commission Vice President for Values and Transparency Věra Jourová backed
Twitter's content moderation policies Monday amid an escalating fight between
the social media platform and U.S. President Donald Trump.
“I support
Twitter in their efforts to develop and implement a transparent, clear and
consistent moderation policy. This is not about censorship. This is about
flagging verifiably false or misleading information that may cause public harm,
linking to reliable information, or flagging content violating their
policies," Jourová told POLITICO in a statement.
For the
first time last week, Twitter labeled a pair of Trump tweets with a
fact-checking notice, triggering furor in the White House. The U.S. president
then signed an executive order that he said would "defend free
speech," by asking regulators to reinterpret a law that shields internet
companies from lawsuits over content on their sites.
Since then,
Twitter has run a warning label on a tweet by Trump, then on a similar one
published from the White House’s official account, arguing they violate the
company's policies on "glorifying violence."
The
Commission on the other hand encourages platforms to moderate content on their
platforms. Google, Facebook and Twitter have signed a code of practice on
disinformation online and the EU's executive arm is expected to present later
this year the European Democracy Action Plan with further rules on the
dissemination of fake news.
"The
role of public authorities is not to interfere with content policies of private
companies but to ensure that fundamental rights are protected online as well as
offline — rights such as freedom of expression and information,
non-discrimination, right to security," Jourová said.
She added,
"These rights protect all citizens, not only those in power. As politicians,
we have to be held to account, and answer to criticism with facts, not with
threats and attacks."
Zuckerberg rejects employee calls to act on Trump
posts
Facing a swell of employee disapproval, the Facebook
CEO defended his decision during a private question-and-answer session with
staff.
By STEVEN
OVERLY
06/02/2020
06:34 PM EDT
Facebook
CEO Mark Zuckerberg stood firm against employees calling for the company to
take action against inflammatory posts from President Donald Trump, saying on
an internal call Tuesday that his decision to leave them untouched was
supported by the social network’s policies.
Zuckerberg’s
defense came during a private question-and-answer session with employees of the
sprawling social network, according to two people on the call. Originally
scheduled for Thursday, the call was moved to earlier in the week in response
to a swell of employee unrest.
The
36-year-old executive has come under unprecedented scrutiny from his own
workforce, including the company’s mainstay engineers, scores of whom organized
a virtual walkout Monday and took to social media with uncharacteristically
public criticism. At least two employees have resigned, citing Zuckerberg’s
inaction.
“It's
crystal clear today that leadership refuses to stand with us,” engineer Brandon
Dail tweeted Tuesday.
Zuckerberg
is “grateful” for employee feedback, Facebook spokesperson Andy Stone said in a
statement, noting "open and honest discussion has always been a part of
Facebook's culture.”
The
Facebook chief’s continued defense of his decision despite growing censure
illustrates his increased willingness to stand behind a politically divisive,
and for some, unpopular opinion regardless of the fallout.
Zuckerberg
has taken an increasingly hard-line approach to free speech online in recent
months, saying he believes social media sites should put relatively few filters
on speech, particularly when political leaders are doing the talking. People
should see and judge those words for themselves, he says.
But that
policy has been tested in recent days by the president, who has used social
media to threaten military intervention in cities and states that do not quash
protests. His original inflammatory tweet, which included the phrase “when the
looting starts, the shooting starts,” was penalized by Twitter for “glorifying
violence.”
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Zuckerberg
declined to take action despite a “visceral negative reaction” to Trump’s
words, he said in a Facebook post Friday.
“I know
many people are upset that we've left the president's posts up, but our
position is that we should enable as much expression as possible unless it will
cause imminent risk of specific harms or dangers spelled out in clear
policies,” he said.
Since then,
the president has continued to ratchet up the hostile rhetoric and streets
across America have come to resemble war zones. Police have clashed violently
in some instances with protesters, most of whom are marching and chanting for
justice peacefully. On Monday, federal police used tear gas to remove peaceful
demonstrators from a park near the White House so the president could pose for
photos in front of the historic St. John's Episcopal Church.
Facebook’s
inaction in the face of increasingly dangerous social unrest has drawn sharp
rebuke from civil rights leaders, many of whom have collaborated with Zuckerberg
and other company executives on policies to make the social network more
inclusive of minority users.
Several of
those leaders were “disappointed and stunned” after a call with Zuckerberg on
Monday evening, saying the explanation he offered for Facebook’s decisions were
“incomprehensible.”
“He did not
demonstrate understanding of historic or modern-day voter suppression and he
refuses to acknowledge how Facebook is facilitating Trump's call for violence
against protesters,” according to the leaders of Color of Change, the NAACP
Legal Defense and Educational Fund and The Leadership Conference on Civil and
Human Rights. “Mark is setting a very dangerous precedent for other voices who
would say similar harmful things on Facebook.”
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