The management of hate speech on the platforms of digital social networks: a comparison between Facebook, Twitter and YouTube

Abstract

The social stalemate over hate speech and free speech on the Internet has pushed Social Networking Sites (SNS) to intensify their content moderation policies. The management of hateful content on platforms such as Facebook, Twitter and Youtube is so complex, given its multifaceted character and the large number of interactors, that executives of these companies assume the inefficiency of their resources (human and technological) in an attempt to control the scheduling, duration, diffusion, and circumspection of crimes and hate speeches. The problem has awakened the attention of governments and civil organizations, which in turn increase the pressure on the platforms to improve their editorial choices and their logistics of monitoring and removing this type of interaction. In this context, this work aims to compare the actions carried out by Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube in the formulation and expansion of policies and decisions on individual hateful content. For this, a historical analysis (2015-2018) of secondary data of the specific policies and community terms of each SRS was carried out in a review of the decision-making with the five topics of the commitment term that the companies assumed with the ADL - Anti-Defamation League, in 2013, in the fight against hate speech online. The results point to Facebook as the SRS that most invested in strategies to combat intolerance and incivility online, although the company did not make clear the methods used for this purpose. Overall, all platforms evolved in the operational structure of denouncing cyberhate but were inefficient in moderation, removal, and containment of cyberhate propagation.