Facebook defends decision to bring content moderators back to offices despite Covid-19 risks

Facebook executives on Thursday defended the corporate’s decision to bring content moderators back into offices within the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, someday after greater than 200 of those contractors published an open letter urging the corporate to allow them to do business from home.

Facebook vp of integrity Guy Rosen stated the corporate wants a few of its most delicate content reviewed from an workplace setting however has taken steps to make these environments secure.

“We’re not able to route some of the most sensitive and graphic content to outsourced reviewers at home,” Rosen stated on a press name Thursday morning. “This is really sensitive content. This is not something you want people reviewing from home with their family around.”

In the letter, which was addressed to CEO Mark Zuckerberg, the moderators declare Facebook is needlessly risking their lives. The moderators demand that Facebook maximize working from house, supply hazard pay and finish outsourcing.

Asked what portion of the corporate’s content evaluation workforce has returned to their offices, Rosen declined to give a selected determine however stated that almost all of these employees are nonetheless working from house. 

“We’ve always had some employees in critical jobs who needed to come into some of our global facilities, these are things like data centers and so forth, and we have very strict safety standards that we are employing at those locations,” Rosen stated.

Other roles which have additionally returned to the offices embody safety groups and {hardware} engineers, Rosen stated. Among the well being and security measures in place are considerably decreased capability, bodily distancing, obligatory temperature checks, obligatory masks, each day deep cleanings, hand sanitizers and air filter adjustments, Rosen stated. The firm has additionally introduced on full-time staff to assist with content evaluation, asking them to deal with extra delicate content, Rosen stated.

“The facilities meet or exceed the guidance on a safe work space,” Rosen stated.

The firm additionally addressed the open letter’s criticism that Facebook’s AI software program isn’t up the duty of detecting all the kind of content that breaches the corporate’s insurance policies.

“Our investments in AI are helping us detect and remove this content to keep people safe,” Rosen stated. “The reason … we are bringing some workers back to the offices is exactly in order to ensure we can have that balance of people and AI working on these areas.”

Additionally, the corporate on Thursday for the primary time disclosed how a lot hate speech content it faraway from Facebook and Instagram. During the third quarter, the corporate eliminated 22.1 million items of hate speech. That got here out to 0.11% of content considered on Facebook being hate speech.

The firm additionally offered an replace on its efforts to average content associated to the U.S. election and Covid-19.

Facebook additionally shared that since March it eliminated greater than 265,000 items of content within the U.S. from Facebook and Instagram for violating the corporate’s voter interference insurance policies.  Rosen stated that 140 million folks visited the corporate’s voting data middle, with 33 million itemizing it on Election Day. The firm additionally positioned warning labels on greater than 180 million items of debunked misinformation. 

Between March and October, Facebook eliminated greater than 12 million items of content from Facebook and Instagram that contained misinformation associated to Covid-19 that would lead to imminent bodily hurt. This consists of content associated to exaggerated cures or pretend preventative measures. The firm additionally displayed warnings on about 167 million items of content containing debunked Covid-19 misinformation. 

Rosen stated 95% of customers don’t click on to view content that’s lined by a warning display screen.