Google Has A Moderation Equipment To War Terrorist Content On Smaller Web Sites

Google joins Meta as a technology giant that helps eradicate terrorist content. (photo: dock. google)

JAKARTA - Google has joined Meta as a technology giant that has helped eradicate terrorist content. The company is reportedly developing a free moderation tool and can be used by smaller websites.

This tool is useful for identifying and deleting terrorist material on smaller websites. Google is not alone in developing it, it partnered with a subsidiary of Google's Jikejadi division and Tech Against Terrorism backed by the United Nations.

Like Meta's open source utility, this moderation tool is meant to help sites that are unable to develop AI detection algorithms or employ large moderation staff.

This may be necessary when the European Union's Digital Service Act and the UK's online Security Bill will require site operators to withdraw extremist content to avoid penalties.

There are many websites that don't have people to enforce the law. It's a very labor-intensive thing even to build algorithms (and) then you need all those human reviewers," said Jikali's chief executive, Yasmin Green.

Later, this moderation tool will rely on a database containing alleged terrorist content collected by the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism formed by Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter, and YouTube in 2017. Two unnamed sites will test code later this year.

Launching Engadget, Wednesday, January 4, both Google and Tech Against Terrorism see their projects needed to close gaps in fighting online terrorist activity.

Online terrorists often switch to smaller websites and are not always able to monitor users adequately. This tool reduces the chances of terrorists finding safe shelters.

However, Google did not necessarily help this small and medium-sized site just because of its kindness.

While the project is not expected to generate profits anytime soon, Green told The Financial Times in Google's best interest in supporting a compliant and anti-terrorism web.

"There is an understanding that there is a long-term business return. Google needs a healthier internet," Green said.

Meanwhile, the new Meta moderation tool, the Hasher-Matcher-Actioner (HMA), is available for various companies interested in detecting terrorist or extremist content.

In this case, the HMA tool uses hash from known terrorist content so that platforms or sites can detect duplicate images or videos, then have the potential to take law enforcement action against them.