From Labour List
How should we regulate online extremism?
By Sir Ivor Roberts
After the harrowing attack in Christchurch — infamous for being live-streamed on Facebook — New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern commented, "It's critical that technology platforms like Facebook are not perverted as a tool for terrorism, and instead become part of a global solution to countering extremism.”
Facebook is not alone; all social media platforms have been used by extremists to radicalise users and instigate acts of terrorism. For example, Salman Abedi, the terrorist who attached Manchester Arena in May 2017, had been radicalised watching ISIS videos on Twitter.
Thus, preventing online extremism has become a priority for European policy-makers. Technology like the Counter Extremism Project's eGlyph, a tool developed by UC Berkeley professor Hany Farid, should be used to screen out extremist content on social media platforms. eGlyph is capable of comparing uploaded content to a databse of known extremist images, videos, and audio files, and as a result, it is an effective tool to disrupt the spread of extremist content.
Hany Farid is a professor at the UC Berkeley School of Information and EECS. He specializes in digital forensics.
