Christchurch terror: Facebook working ‘around the clock’ to remove massacre video

Facebook is working to stamp out replays of the shooting, the social media giant criticised for not removing it faster.

Facebook is working “around the clock” to remove the Christchurch massacre video from reappearing on its platform. Picture: AP

Facebook is working with the New Zealand Police after the terror attack in Christchurch was live streamed on its social media platform, with the US company criticised for not removing it faster.

In his first public comments, Chris Sonderby, vice-president and deputy general counsel at Facebook, said it continues to “work around the clock to prevent this content from appearing on our site, using a combination of technology and people.”

“We removed the attacker’s video within minutes of their outreach to us, and in the aftermath, we have been providing an on-the-ground resource for law enforcement authorities,” he said.

Accused gunman Brenton Tarrant allegedly live-streamed the attack on two Christchurch mosques on Facebook. Several broadcasters, including Nine and Sky News have been criticised for using some of the violent footage.

Mr Sonderby said Facebook has been asked by the NZ police, who are still investigating the attack which killed 50 people, to not “share certain details” but could provide some information.

The video was viewed “fewer than 200 times during the live broadcast”, and no users reported the video during the live broadcast.

Including the views during the live broadcast, the video was viewed about 4000 times in total before being removed from Facebook.

The first user report on the original video came in 29 minutes after the video started, and 12 minutes after the live broadcast ended.

Before Facebook was alerted to the video, a user on the 8chan online image board posted a link to a copy of the video on a file-sharing site, Mr Sonderby said.

“We designated both shootings as terror attacks, meaning that any praise, support and representation of the events violates our Community Standards and is not permitted on Facebook,” Mr Sonderby said in a statement posted on its website.

The company also removed the personal accounts of Tarrant from Facebook and Instagram, and are “actively identifying and removing any impostor accounts that surface.”

“We removed the original Facebook Live video and hashed it so that other shares that are visually similar to that video are then detected and automatically removed from Facebook and Instagram,” Mr Sonderby said.

“Some variants such as screen recordings were more difficult to detect, so we expanded to additional detection systems including the use of audio technology.”

In the first 24 hours of the attack, Facebook removed about 1.5 million videos of the attack globally, and more than 1.2 million of those videos were blocked at upload.

Mr Sonderby said member organisations of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism co-ordinate regularly on terrorism and have been in “close contact since the attack.”

Facebook has shared more than 800 visually-distinct videos related to the attack via its collective database, along with URLs and context on its enforcement approaches.

“This incident highlights the importance of industry co-operation regarding the range of terrorists and violent extremists operating online,” he said.

“We identified abusive content on other social media sites in order to assess whether or how that content might migrate to one of our platforms.”