Israeli Ministers Approve ‘Facebook Law’ Against Web Incitement
Israeli Ministers Approve ‘Facebook Law’ Against Web
Incitement
Bill would let court issue warrants for removal of
content
Cabinet to discuss tougher measures amid free-speech
concerns
by Gwen Ackerman December 25, 2016, 7:01 AM PST
Israeli courts could demand that companies such as
Facebook Inc. remove content deemed as incitement, under a bill that that will
head for parliamentary approval amid concerns about free speech.
The law would give Israel the tools “to have content
liable to lead to murder and terror removed immediately,” Public Security
Minister Gilad Erdan said via text message after an Israeli ministerial
committee approved the bill Sunday.
Erdan and Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked have continued
pushing the bill even after Facebook agreed in a September meeting to create
joint teams to deal with Internet incitement. Israel’s Cabinet said Sunday it
would discuss even tougher measures against violent content on the web, without
indicating what those measures might be.
The Internet giants aren’t ignoring the problem:
Facebook, Microsoft Corp., Twitter Inc. and YouTube said earlier this month
they were creating a shared database to help enforce policies against online
terrorist content. After the September meeting in Israel, Facebook said it has
“zero tolerance for terrorism.”
Limiting Speech?
In an e-mailed statement Sunday, Facebook said it works
“aggressively” to remove problematic content “as soon as we become aware of
it.” The company said it hopes to continue a “constructive dialogue” with
Israel that includes “careful consideration of the implications of this bill
for Israeli democracy, freedom of speech, the open Internet and the dynamism of
the Israeli Internet sector.”
Tehilla Shwartz Altshuler, head of the Israel Democracy
Institute’s Center for Democratic Values and Institutions, called the bill “an
assault on freedom of expression on an international scale.” Compared to
similar legislation in other countries, the Israeli bill would hold content
providers like Facebook and Google parent Alphabet Inc. to a much higher level
of responsibility, Shwartz Altshuler said in an e-mailed statement.
“The ‘Facebook Bill’ needs to be substantially revised,”
she said.
After attackers opened fire at a social services center
in San Bernardino, California in July, killing 14 people and wounding 22, U.S.
President Barack Obama asked Silicon Valley firms to work with law enforcement
to prevent terrorists from using social media and encryption technologies to
encourage violence.
Influencing Attackers
Shaked noted that some 71 percent of 1,755 complaints
about incitement filed to Internet companies this year were addressed
immediately. Still, while she welcomed the Internet companies’ cooperation,
"it is important that it be obligatory and not on a whim,” she said in an
e-mailed statement.
Many Palestinians arrested this year after attacking
Israelis said they had been influenced by content on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube
and other online platforms, Erdan and Shaked said in September.
Lawyers filed a $1 billion lawsuit against Facebook in
July, alleging it allowed the Palestinian militant group Hamas to use its
platform to plot attacks that killed four Americans. That same month, Erdan
accused Facebook of complicity in Palestinian violence, saying the blood of a
13-year-old Israeli girl stabbed to death in her bed was “partially on
Facebook’s hands.”
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