With the advent of Facebook Live, the social media website has seen an uptick in livestreamed suicides, killings, sex crimes, abuse—the painful list goes on and on.
Now Facebook is slated to hire 3,000 more people to review videos and posts of crime and other questionable content, following the seeming increase in the number of such incidents that are documented on its site, the Los Angeles Times reports.
The 3,000 people are in addition to the 4,500 individuals already tasked to take part in such reviews.
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the new additions in a Facebook post Wednesday.
“These reviewers will also help us get better at removing things we don’t allow on Facebook like hate speech and child exploitation. And we’ll keep working with local community groups and law enforcement who are in the best position to help someone if they need it—either because they’re about to harm themselves, or because they’re in danger from someone else,” Zuckerberg said in his statement.
As the Times notes, Facebook has been facing criticism for not doing enough to prevent videos of these awful crimes from spreading across its platform. Most recently, in the United States, Robert Godwin Sr., 74, was gunned down on Facebook Live by Steve Stephens, who later killed himself as he was being pursued by police.
The video shocked the nation and added insult to an already horrific injury for the family, who had their loved one’s death broadcast online.
And back in March, in Chicago, a 15-year-old girl was sexually assaulted by multiple men or boys on a Facebook Live broadcast that was allegedly watched by at least 40 people, none of whom reported the incident.
Zuckerberg promised in his statement that it would be easier to report issues and that the process by which reviewers determine which posts violate the community standards would also be speeded up.
“In addition to investing in more people, we’re also building better tools to keep our community safe. We’re going to make it simpler to report problems to us, faster for our reviewers to determine which posts violate our standards and easier for them to contact law enforcement if someone needs help. As these become available they should help make our community safer,” Zuckerberg added.
Read more at the Los Angeles Times.