Meta Launches Free Tool "Hasher-Matcher-Actioner" That Can Fight Terrorist Content

JAKARTA - Meta has just developed a state-of-the-art open-source tool that claims to be able to fight terrorist, pornographic and violent content in cyberspace.

Dubbed Hasher-Matcher-Actioner (HMA), the tool can identify suspicious content, including images or videos that violate certain guidelines and have been flagged by users as inappropriate or pornographic.

HMA may then act against the material collectively. Meta says HMA tools can be adopted by companies looking to fight terrorism on their platforms and stop its spread.

The types of content that this tool hunts include child exploitation, terrorist propaganda, and so on. Such content is against the rules of most websites.

Of course, HMA is especially useful for small companies that don't have a larger pool of resources but want to improve their security.

As the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, Meta believes this new tool can help fight the presence of such content on the web. When used by websites globally, it can make the internet a safer place for everyone.

Launching Android Headlines, Wednesday, December 14, the way this tool works is quite simple, first, the user of this tool (website owner) must identify pornographic content such as videos or images and enter that data into HMA. The tool will then identify the specific content it receives from the user and start scanning the web.

For the identification process, HMA generates a unique digital hash or fingerprint and associates it with the content. Furthermore, the tool will store the hash in the user (website owner) database to test various content published on the website. When someone else uploads such content to the website again, it will be redirected to the database to go through testing.

If any content coming to the website matches the hash, certain actions can be taken. Website owners can now remove violating content from sites automatically or on a case-by-case basis. By doing so, website owners will be able to reduce terrorist content as well as other pornographic content on their sites.

Meta does not charge website owners when they use the HMA tool. The company says more than 40,000 people have worked to create anti-terrorist and pornographic content tools.

For your information, the decision to make the tool available to the public comes shortly before Meta takes over as chairman of the board of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) in January next year.

GIFCT is a group that brings together member companies, governments, and civil society organizations to tackle terrorist content online. Meta has been a founding member.