Facebook faces heat for censoring posts on Kashmir unrest

Burhan Wani, 22, a senior member of the Hizbul Mujahideen rebel group, died in a gunfight with the Indian army on July 8, 2016. According to the Kashmir police at least 30 people died in the violent protests following the shooting of the Kashmiri-militant leader.

When mobile coverage, landlines and internet services were curbed throughout the region, and authorities imposed ban on local newspaper, people turned to the social networking sites for information or to post their views. However, users were surprised to see that social networking service Facebook was censoring their posts and comments.

Facebook received criticism after it censored users’ posts and also disabled their accounts for posting their comments on the death of Burhan Wani.

Many Facebook account holders, including Academics, journalist, including the local newspaper Kashmir Monitors, were among those who had their posts allegedly deleted from the social networking website.

Hamza Ali Abbasi, a Pakistani actor, also had his post removed from Facebook too. Abbasi had tweeted, ‘My FB account deactivated for talking about KASHMIR. #Kashmir #FreeKashmir, #RIPFreedom of Expression.’

Later, several activists, scholars, writers, namely Dibyesh Anand (an academic at the University of Westminster, UK), Naila Smith, Rollie Mukherjee and Mary Scully (a socialist presidential candidate in US), initiated a petition that demanded Facebook to respect the US bill of Rights, and stop censoring users' posts.

Dibyesh Anand said: ‘I had my first post removed on July 12, 2016, and was the account was blocked, restricting me from posting for 24 hours. When it was over, I received a message from Facebook with formal apology.'

There is no place on the social website for content that praises or supports terrorists, terrorist organisations or terrorism - Facebook.

‘Disturbingly, once again on July 14, soon after receiving the apology, I was censored again and on July 15, I was blocked again for 24 hours for the following post. It was clear that it is not same faulty algorithm but action of a team member,' he added, concluding, ‘Once I was back online, I sent numerous complaints to Facebook’s help centre.’

After he complained, he once again received an apology from Facebook saying that the posts were taken down accidentally by their team.

Facebook replied to Dibyesh, stating, ‘A member of our team accidentally removed you posted on Facebook. This was a mistake, and we sincerely apologize for this error. We’ve since restored the content, and you should now be able to see it.’

However, Dibyesh said, ‘ It is not an “accident” but either active censorship on part of Facebook under pressure from Indian government (Facebook's head office for Asia is based in Hyderabad, and deals with Community Standard) or unprofessional employees who are letting their bias affect what posts and profiles they censor and block on Facebook.’

‘The petition is the beginning of a campaign to defend freedom of speech on Facebook and social media. The importance of that cannot be overstated. Keep in mind that the internet in Kashmir is locked down and Kashmiris are unable to sign. But this petition isn't just about Kashmir; it's about freedom of speech and whether or not we take a stand to defend it,’ read Mary Scully's post on Facebook.

In a statement to The Guardian, Facebook said, 'there is no place on the social website for content that praises or supports terrorists, terrorist organisations or terrorism. We welcome discussions on these subjects, but any terrorist content has to be clearly put in context, which condemns these organisations and or their violent activities. Therefore, profiles and content supporting or praising Hizbul Mujahideen and Burhan Wani are removed as soon as they are reported to us. In this instance, some content was removed in error, but this has now been restored.'

Dibyesh added, 'Facebook is a global company and claims to be committed to giving "people the power to share and make the world more open and connected". If it starts censoring voices that are not promoting violence but are critical of state and nationalist violence, it fails in its mission. We hope that through our petition we highlight the issue of conscious or unconscious censorship of critical voices on social media. At the very least, FB should know that even if we are treated as "customers", we cannot be taken for granted nor can we be bullied. By focusing on specific demands, we are giving FB the opportunity to come clean about its stance on censorship of posts highlighting state atrocities in Kashmir.'

What do you think? Should Facebook be censoring posts and comments on sensitive topics? Write down your comments below.