G7: tech companies must do more against extremism on the internet

At a summit in Italy, the G7 countries, including the US, UK and the EU, called on tech companies to take stricter action against extremism on the internet. This should prevent ‘misuse of the internet by terrorists’.

The call took the form of a joint call declaration, in which the G7 participants state their position on terrorism and extremism. In it, the countries write: “The G7 calls on communication service providers and social media companies to take stricter action against terrorist content. We recommend that they quickly build and share new tools that can automatically detect content that incites violence.” The announcement follows an attack in Manchester that left 22 dead fell.

According to British Prime Minister Theresa May, ‘the battle is moving from the battlefield to the internet’, writes news agency AFP. After an attack in London in March, she called on internet companies to do more against online extremism. She then targeted companies such as Facebook and Google, among others.

In the European Union, a year ago, the Commission established a code of conduct on the removal of hate speech on the Internet. This drew criticism from civil rights groups, who said it gave the companies the power to judge what content is and isn’t allowed. In December of last year it appeared that the EU was not satisfied with the approach and in April reports emerged that legislation in this area is being considered. Before that, several tech companies had announced the creation of a joint database, in which they share hashes of deleted content.