ISIS Victim Suit Ties Twitter Ads to Terrorist Propaganda
ISIS Victim Suit Ties Twitter Ads to Terrorist Propaganda
by Kartikay Mehrotra
December 2, 2016 — 9:02 PM EST December 3, 2016 — 12:06
AM EST
Family of woman slain in Paris attack amends social media
suit
Google, Facebook, Twitter accused of profiting on ISIS
posts
The family of a woman slain in the 2015 Paris attacks
claims in a lawsuit that Twitter Inc., Facebook Inc. and Google profit from
targeted advertising linked to terrorist propaganda promoting violence.
The case is one of several complaints in U.S. courts
alleging that the social media giants have played crucial roles in the growth
of terrorist organizations in recent years. The biggest hurdle facing such
claims is a federal law that insulates publishers from liability for the speech
of others.
The family of Nohemi Gonzalez, who was fatally shot in
the Paris attacks, said Friday in a revised version of a lawsuit initially
filed in June that the companies created “original content” by tying
advertisements to ISIS-supported posts and generating revenue from them.
By relying on algorithms that target specific ads to
users based on the content they’re viewing, the companies are acting outside
the Communications Decency Act ’s protection for internet platforms that are
used to share text, photos and videos, said Keith Altman, a lawyer for the
Gonzalez family.
“Although defendants have not created the posting, nor
have they created the advertisement, defendants have created new unique content
by choosing which advertisement to combine with the posting," according to
the revised complaint Altman filed Friday in federal court in Oakland,
California.
Twitter spokesman Nu Wexler declined to comment on the
lawsuit. Representatives of Facebook and Alphabet Inc.’s Google didn’t
immediately respond after regular business hours to phone and e-mail messages
seeking comment.
547 Followers
The Gonzalez family also alleges that social media
outlets have done little to permanently remove ISIS backers from their sites.
The complaint cites a Twitter user with the handle “DriftOne00146” that was
removed 145 times before being reintroduced for a 146th iteration. Within days
and a dozen posts, the user had 547 followers, according to the complaint.
President Barack Obama asked Silicon Valley firms last
year to work with U.S. law enforcement authorities to prevent terrorists from
using social media and encryption technologies. As of August, Twitter had
suspended some 460,000 accounts linked to terrorist groups since mid-2015.
That same month, Twitter won dismissal of a lawsuit in
San Francisco alleging that posts supporting ISIS ultimately led to the death
of a U.S. citizen in Amman, Jordan. That complaint didn’t include claims
related to ad revenue generated by the postings.
The case is Gonzalez v. Twitter Inc., 16-cv-03282, U.S.
District Court, Northern District of California (Oakland).
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