What Facebook and Twitter ban: New tool tracks social media censorship

Have you ever had a post removed from Facebook,Twitter or Instagram?

Whether it's removing photos of women breastfeeding, or political speechbeing banned,social media sites get to decide what is and isn't acceptable on their services.

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But this week, a group of researchers islaunching a new toolfor reporting instances of social media censorship.

These companies now have as much control over our speech as the state or the church did in the past.- Jillian York, Co-Founder of OnlineCensorship.org

OnlineCensorship.org was founded byJillian Yorkof theElectronic Frontier Foundation, a group that advocates for internet freedom, andRamzi Jaber of Visualizing Impact, a firm that designs visual tools for presenting data. The new censorship trackerisdesigned to collect as much information as possible about what content gets taken down from social media.

Although each social media platform has its own terms of service, the rules governing what is and isn't acceptable can sometimesbe opaque. By collecting data on what is removed, researchers hope to get a clearer picture of whatcensorship looks like on the social media platforms we use to communicate every day.

"Basically these spaces are where our daily interactions take place, and these companies now have as much control over our speech as the state or the church did in the past," said York.

Think you've been censored? Fill out a report

Starting Nov. 19, you'll be able to file a report on the new website.

It'll ask you a bunch of questions such as:

• Which social network are youusing?
• What type of content was taken down?
• What languagewas it posted in?
• Was a new event associated with thepost?

According toYork,the survey is in-depthbut users can choose to keep their answers confidential. You don't need to submit any personally identifying information if you don't want to.

Bringing social media censorship into focus

Once they have enough reports, York and Jaberaregoing to crunch the numbers.

The plan is to do a bunch of data analysis, to create data visualizations, andshow what censorship looks like on social media platforms around the world.Because social media companies have to comply with local laws, the researchers are interested in how censorship works on both acountry-by-country and topic-by-topicbasis.

The goal here is understand how social media services enforce their terms of service: how they decide what's acceptableand unacceptable.

York says it's a good reminder that so much ofwhat we think of as "public discourse" is actually happening on privately-owned online services like Facebook,Twitter andInstagram.

"I think it's really important for us to think what sort of commitment these companies owe us not necessarily on a legal level,but on a moral or ethical one to hold up free speech."