Such posts and comments are permitted if they are relevant to Russia’s conflict with Ukraine.
According to internal documents acquired by Reuters on Thursday, Meta Platforms will temporarily allow users of Facebook and Instagram in some regions to call for violence against Russians and the Russian military during the Ukraine invasion.
Aside from that, it’s also temporarily allowing some messages that advocate for the killing of Russian President Vladimir Putin or Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
“As a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine we have temporarily made allowances for forms of political expression that would normally violate our rules like violent speech such as ‘death to the Russian invaders.’ We still won’t allow credible calls for violence against Russian civilians,” a Meta spokesperson said in a statement.
In a recent revision to the company’s guidelines on violence and incitement, one email stated that calls for the leaders’ murders will be tolerated unless they include additional targets or have two markers of credibility, such as the place or manner.
Russia’s embassy in Washington urged that Meta’s “extremist activities” be stopped, citing a Reuters report.
Russian Embassy in the US: Noted the @Reuters message that the @Meta permitted to post calls for violence against the Russian leadership & our military personnel on #Facebook & #Instagram. https://t.co/REv9dnA5rv
— Russia in India 🇷🇺 (@RusEmbIndia) March 11, 2022
“Users of Facebook & Instagram did not give the owners of these platforms the right to determine the criteria of truth and pit nations against each other,” the embassy said on Twitter in a message that was also shared by their India office.
According to one email, the policy restrictions on calls for violence against Russian soldiers are temporary and apply to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine.
Meta just released an email to moderators informing them of a revision in its hate speech policy, which applies to both Russian forces and Russians in the context of the invasion.
“We are issuing a spirit-of-the-policy allowance to allow T1 violent speech that would otherwise be removed under the Hate Speech policy when: (a) targeting Russian soldiers, EXCEPT prisoners of war, or (b) targeting Russians where it’s clear that the context is the Russian invasion of Ukraine (e.g., content mentions the invasion, self-defense, etc.),” it said in the email.
“We are doing this because we have observed that in this specific context, ‘Russian soldiers’ is being used as a proxy for the Russian military. The Hate Speech policy continues to prohibit attacks on Russians,” the email stated.
Russia announced last week that it will ban Facebook in the nation due to what it claimed were limits on access to Russian media on the platform. During its invasion of Ukraine, which it refers to as a “special operation,” Moscow has targeted tech businesses, including Twitter, which has stated that it is blocked in the nation.
A number of major social media sites have made announcements about new content restrictions in light of the crisis, including barring Russian state media outlets RT and Sputnik in the European Union, and have exhibited exceptions to some of its policies during the war.
Emails also revealed that, in a shift originally reported by The Intercept, Meta will allow praise of the right-wing Azov brigade, which is generally barred.
The Meta spokesperson previously said the company was “for the time being, making a narrow exception for praise of the Azov Regiment strictly in the context of defending Ukraine, or in their role as part of the Ukraine National Guard.”
Image Credit: Getty
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