ISLAMABAD: Evidence of alleged human rights violations and war crimes may be lost after being removed by tech companies, including Meta and Youtube.
The BBC said that social media platforms erase graphic videos, frequently using artificial intelligence, yet footage that might help prosecutions can be removed without being archived.
Meta and YouTube say they want to strike a balance between bearing witness and protecting people from bad content. However, Alan Rusbridger, a Meta’s Oversight Board member, claims that the industry has been “overcautious” in moderation.
The platforms claim to have exceptions for graphic material in the public interest, but when the BBC attempted to post footage documenting attacks on civilians in Ukraine, it was quickly banned. Artificial intelligence (AI) can detect and eliminate dangerous and unlawful information on a large scale. On the other hand, machines lack the complexity required to identify human rights abuses when censoring horrific photos from wars.
Former travel journalist Ihor Zakharenko witnessed this in Ukraine. He has been documenting attacks on civilians since the Russian invasion. The BBC met him in a Kyiv district where men, women, and children were shot dead by Russian troops while fleeing occupation a year ago. He filmed the bodies (at least 17 of them) and burnt-out cars.
He intended to put the videos online so that the rest of the world could witness what happened and counter the Kremlin’s narrative. However, they were quickly removed when he shared them on Facebook and Instagram. Ihor said the Russians themselves claimed that those were fakes, that they didn’t hurt people, and that they fought solely with the Ukrainian army.
We used dummy accounts to upload Ihor’s footage to Instagram and YouTube. Within a minute, Instagram had removed three of the four videos. YouTube initially applied age limits on the same three videos, then deleted them all 10 minutes later.
