Silicon Valley teams up to fight terrorism

 Silicon Valley’s response is to take on terrorism with The Global  Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism formed by Facebook, YouTube, Twitter  and Microsoft. The companies have been criticised by the US, UK and French  governments for allowing terrorists to use their networks to organise  themselves, spread propaganda and construct weapons. 

The companies say they will share techniques for “content detection  and classification techniques using machine learning” and “define  standard transparency reporting methods for terrorist content removals”  and “identify how best to counter extremism and online hate, while  respecting freedom of expression and privacy”. 

Google, Facebook, Twitter and Microsoft already collaborate on a  scheme that notifies them when one of the group removes a terrorist  posting, prompting the others to follow suit. One difficulty for moderators is distinguishing between the postings  of groups which are seen as terrorists by some but as freedom fighters  by others.