Recently users of Facebook have been reporting rude and unwanted images including nude and disturbing content which has not been removed by Facebook swiftly as they may not have seen the material. There are 800 million active users out of which a fair few must have seen at some point some unwanted pictures on their news feed. Facebook should really respond to this content as soon as it is published because even if it is up for a day or two it can be viewed by thousands of users. Facebook is a social network such that everyone is connected to their friends and can also view various posts made by friends of friends, therefore they may be able to see photos and links which are offensive to them even though they do not wish to access them, but the network is such that posts are updated on users’ news feed on a regular basis.
Facebook allows users above the age of 13 to create an account. This is a very young age, therefore it is easy for them to come across or even find pornographic and unwanted material on Facebook. In my opinion the minimum age for creating a Facebook account should be at least 16. Nowadays facebook has taken over lives of kids whereas when I was 13 I had no access to any social networks. This shows the effect Facebook has had on youngsters. This makes the matter of unwanted content even more serious as children should not be viewing pornographic images, especially at their age. It is understandably hard for Facebook to identify each and every content but there should be a system which can realise material swiftly and then have the profiles of those users reported so that no such images are published again.
Another issue I came across was the creation of certain groups on Facebook which may also offend certain groups of people and individuals. It is so easy to create a group in minutes. No consent is required from Facebook, therefore users can create any groups which are publicly viewable and may be up for days, weeks or even months before it has been realised by Facebook as being offensive. These groups are often made public; therefore any users can access it whether they are children or adults. There should be some restrictions made on these groups if Facebook doesn’t choose to remove or block them.
So to summarise, I feel there is a need for a better system on Facebook that can identify unwanted images and groups and remove them within hours so that it is not viewed by many users. What are your views on this topic?
With the recent spam attack of offensive and violent material all over Facebook, the children under 16 using the social networking site may have seen the images which I am sure their parents would not be impressed by. It is disturbing for both the children and their parents so Facebook need to design a more effective security system to stop these things happening in the near future. I feel they should check content being posted to see if it is offensive before people see it, not after millions of people have come across the material.
ReplyDeleteSanjitha, with over 250 million pictures being uploaded every day and thats only pictures(facebook's own stats http://goo.gl/lC9YO) do you think the idea of each picture being checked is feasible?
ReplyDeleteEven automated image-recognition tools are notorious for being unreliable.
Whilst the current system isn't great isn't it up to us to police the system ourselves by reporting images?
I concur with Chris that monitoring of each individual post will be unfeasible, bordering impossible, due to as Chris stated the sheer number of posts made. In addition, posts one may interpret to be offensive may not considered offensive to another. For instance, the recent YouTube video ‘Racist Woman On Tram’ could be considered offensive or disturbing to one but to another person the video could provide an interesting insight into racism in England today.
ReplyDeleteI agree a 100%. It is very unfortunate that facebook accepts members from the age of thirteen. This must be difficult for parents to manage within their homes, particularly those who already find it a challenge to get their children to obey them. Facebook definitely needs to create an adequate system designed specifically to identify unwanted images and groups, and have them remove before viewed by many users.
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