Google developing free anti-terrorism moderation tool for smaller websites

According to the Financial Times, the software is being developed in collaboration with Google's research and development unit Jigsaw and the UN-supported Tech Against Terrorism, an initiative that assists tech companies in combating online terrorism.

San Francisco: Google is reportedly developing a free moderation tool that smaller websites can use to identify and remove terrorist material.

According to the Financial Times, the software is being developed in collaboration with Google’s research and development unit Jigsaw and the UN-supported Tech Against Terrorism, an initiative that assists tech companies in combating online terrorism.

“There are a lot of websites that just don’t have any people to do the enforcement. It is a really labour-intensive thing to even build the algorithms [and] then you need all those human reviewers,” Yasmin Green, chief executive of Jigsaw, was quoted as saying.

“(Smaller websites) do not want Isis content there, but there is a tonne of it all over (them),” she added.

The move comes as internet companies will be forced to remove extremist content from their platforms or face fines and other penalties under laws, said the report.

GIFCT (Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism), a non-governmental organisation founded by Facebook, Microsoft, Twitter and YouTube in 2017 to foster partnerships between many tech platforms, is supporting the project by Jigsaw, the report added.

Meanwhile, Meta launched a new open-source software tool called “Hasher-Matcher-Actioner” (HMA) that will help platforms stop the spread of terror content, child exploitation, or any other violating content.

With HMA, platforms will be able to scan for any violating content and take action as required.

HMA builds on Meta’s previous open-source image and video matching software, which can be used for any type of violating content.