Facebook failed to remove sexualised images of children and then call the police on the BBC

[Werewolf]

The BBC's position, as made abundantly clear on the 6o'c News, is that any image of a child accompanied by an "inappropriate comment" should be considered "sexualised images of children" and be removed under FB's terms of service.

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I think that is pretty close to the law, from memory it's not just the image itself but the context it's in, so at the lower end of the scale something that might be ok in a clothing catalogue or family photo album might be considered indecent if used in a way that is intended to sexualise the images*, facebooks TOS are likely written to be very cautious, but like a lot of it's T&C not actually enforced that well**.
So it's a judgement call at times on the behalf of the person trying to work out if they meet the legal definition of indecent, or Facebooks own rules.

I'd guess that the BBC probably had advice of someone who is a legal expert in the field, or has worked in law enforcement in regards to that sort of image, and Facebook are probably relying very heavily on purely automated tools for preliminary checks on content (tools that work well if it's a known, or obvious image, but may not be able to take context into account).


*I'm fairly sure some previously convicted paedophiles have ended up back in jail because they were found to be collecting images of children in swimwear/underwear from clothing catalogues.

**Facebook, Twitter etc are full of content that their rules say they don't allow, but they don't have enough staff (and the tech isn't good enough yet) to actually find a lot of it, or even deal properly with reports and complaints.

 

[Angilion]

Its a bit of an own goal. Yes I know the BBC were fishing for a story and some people would say the BBC should have just sent the links and evidence to the Police from the start but to check the photos, pass them as fine but then report the person sending them for transmitting offensive sexually child abuse pictures is not on. They either are or they aren't.

The person at the BBC was claiming the pictures were illegal, so they were transmitting pictures they thought were illegal.

Given that the BBC was obviously going to take further action against Facebook for not agreeing with them about the legality of the pictures, sending the issue to the police wasn't an own goal. What else could Facebook do?

 

[Greebo]

The person at the BBC was claiming the pictures were illegal, so they were transmitting pictures they thought were illegal.

Given that the BBC was obviously going to take further action against Facebook for not agreeing with them about the legality of the pictures, sending the issue to the police wasn't an own goal. What else could Facebook do?

That would be fine if FB wasnt hosting the images, had already checked the images and certified them as suitable and not illegal. You get what I am saying? Either they are or they aren't. FB already has had a person check and look at these images (its checked by a human not an algorithm ) and they saw no problem with the images.

The fact they then get an email saying "*cough are you sure?" to which they then report the BBC to the police because clearly they are (or there is enough doubt that they might be) is the strange thing. It just proves that the person checking the images either isn't doing their job properly, isn't trained enough or FB just doesn't care about these images. A 18% success rate for checking images clearly isnt good enough.

To be fair the BBC instead of going after a story should have sent the pics/links to the police first and then write up their story.

 

[h4rm0ny]

The fact they then get an email saying "*cough are you sure?" to which they then report the BBC to the police because clearly they are (or there is enough doubt that they might be) is the strange thing. It just proves that the person checking the images either isn't doing their job properly, isn't trained enough or FB just doesn't care about these images. A 18% success rate for checking images clearly isnt good enough.

Or alternately, Facebook sent the images to the police because the police are the next step in the chain. Facebook passed the images (rightly or wrongly, but from the sounds of it because it was user comments that made the images become porn - which is a whole further debate). Then the BBC sent them those images and said they were illegal. So Facebook forwarded it on to the police and said we have this report, we're doing our duty and involving you. Which I think is fair. I have nowhere found anything that shows Facebook were trying to shop the BBC to the police. Getting the police involved is probably a very good idea at this point.

Facebook isn't a person either, who will necessarily do all the joined up thinking and make special exceptions. They're a colossal company with a lot of procedures and policies. Someone flags an image up, policy says someone looks at it and makes a decision. Probably the poor sods have to look at unsavoury images one after the other and they're going through high volume saying: "naked child - ban; ordinary beach picture - pass." They probably can't really go through all the comments and say "well, I think it's an ordinary beach picture but someone further down has posted a comment saying "wow - hot". They're neither police nor lawyers and even those parties would be going back and forth through a lot of grey areas. If another fifteen year old (and let's remember fifteen isn't paedophilia) says "hot", it's a pass. If the comment is from a forty-five year old man, you classify the picture as porn? If the picture is in a collection of ordinary photos without comments, it's a pass, but if the collection is nothing but fifteen year old girls, you ban the image? This all sounds really, really hard and grey. That's even when you accept that adding a comment from a stranger turns your family holiday photo from a family holiday photo to porn. So it may well be that images were passed. Apparently only one picture was unambiguously pornographic and even then without seeing it (which I would far rather not), I'm willing to give Facebook some benefit of the doubt knowing what the BBC can be like from personal experience.

So that's one side of Facebook and their policies. Another side of Facebook and their policies probably say something like "if someone emails you and says 'here is a load of child porn', then refer it to the police immediately". I doubt their policy says something like "if someone emails you child porn then decide for yourself whether you feel like reporting it.". Remember - Facebook isn't a person. Some person watching a series of images on one side of the company and passing them according to company policy isn't the same person or next desk of someone receiving an email saying "I'm sending you child porn". I think people may be ascribing to Facebook a sort of personhood and accompanying nuance that isn't really appropriate for a giant corporation. Bringing in the police seems absolutely the correct thing to do to me. The police can say whether something should be taken further, consider context (i.e. the BBC are probably not a paedophile ring - at least now that Jimmy Saville is dead). It's not like Facebook are attempting to stitch up the BBC which is how the BBC seem to be trying to cast it. The BBC were trying to create a story. I mean, it's the BBC - that's their purpose is news and stories. This wasn't some helpful journalist acting in a private capacity to stop child porn.

So despite the emotive nature of the subject, I'm actually with the poster that called this an "own goal" for the BBC. For those who read superficially and do not consider, I'm sure the BBC look heroic and Facebook evil and tolerant of child porn. But to the majority of people, it makes the BBC sound like they're trying to set themselves up as victims. IMO.

 

[cheesyboy]

Crikey. Just imagine a world where advertisers wanted to target people on facebook who were interested in specific things - Facebook's systems just wouldn't be able to find them....

 

[robgmun]

According to how it was reported on the 6o'c news, only 1 image was actually legally indecent.

The others were "15 year old in bikini at the beach" type material. The BBC deemed these "sexualised images of children" because of the accompanying comments.

IANAL, but an image doesn't become legally indecent/criminal by being accompanied by lewd comments. There are much more concrete criteria to determine what is and isn't child pornography.

Making it an offence to post lewd comments with images of teens in bikinis, is only one step away from making it a crime to think indecent thoughts. As inappropriate as many find it, you have to ask whether it constitutes *by itself* a crime worthy of removing someone's liberty.

Also playing Devil's advocate further, I think it's fair to say that attraction towards a 15 year old does not constitute pedophilia. The BBC article even mentioned "comments about their breasts", which would imply we are not talking about pre-teens, and hence not pedophiles, necessarily.

Busting out the word "pedos" makes it easy for people to grab their pitchforks, but an honest man would probably not deny at some point looking a young woman/girl, and thinking "nice", without necessarily knowing if they were legally adults. Contrast that with pre-pubescent girls which most blokes do not find exciting.

Indeed, some girls by 15 are already fully developed women, look at Natalie Alyn Lind who by 13 looked like an 18 year old, had huge knockers and were showing them off in a push up bra on the internet like crazy on every social media platform from twitter, FB and instagram. millions of people must have clicked on those pictures by mistake thinking she was of age. I would challenge any red blooded male not to think she was hot (a simple google search will being them up) if you didn't know her age. I believe they are not illegal, although i wouldn't post here for respect to the mods so not to give them a headache. The BBC is also being highly hypocritical seeing that amount of pedos that were on their payroll

 

[Greebo]

Or alternately, Facebook sent the images to the police because the police are the next step in the chain. Facebook passed the images (rightly or wrongly, but from the sounds of it because it was user comments that made the images become porn - which is a whole further debate). Then the BBC sent them those images and said they were illegal. So Facebook forwarded it on to the police and said we have this report, we're doing our duty and involving you. Which I think is fair. I have nowhere found anything that shows Facebook were trying to shop the BBC to the police. Getting the police involved is probably a very good idea at this point.

Facebook isn't a person either, who will necessarily do all the joined up thinking and make special exceptions. They're a colossal company with a lot of procedures and policies. Someone flags an image up, policy says someone looks at it and makes a decision. Probably the poor sods have to look at unsavoury images one after the other and they're going through high volume saying: "naked child - ban; ordinary beach picture - pass." They probably can't really go through all the comments and say "well, I think it's an ordinary beach picture but someone further down has posted a comment saying "wow - hot". They're neither police nor lawyers and even those parties would be going back and forth through a lot of grey areas. If another fifteen year old (and let's remember fifteen isn't paedophilia) says "hot", it's a pass. If the comment is from a forty-five year old man, you classify the picture as porn? If the picture is in a collection of ordinary photos without comments, it's a pass, but if the collection is nothing but fifteen year old girls, you ban the image? This all sounds really, really hard and grey. That's even when you accept that adding a comment from a stranger turns your family holiday photo from a family holiday photo to porn. So it may well be that images were passed. Apparently only one picture was unambiguously pornographic and even then without seeing it (which I would far rather not), I'm willing to give Facebook some benefit of the doubt knowing what the BBC can be like from personal experience.

So that's one side of Facebook and their policies. Another side of Facebook and their policies probably say something like "if someone emails you and says 'here is a load of child porn', then refer it to the police immediately". I doubt their policy says something like "if someone emails you child porn then decide for yourself whether you feel like reporting it.". Remember - Facebook isn't a person. Some person watching a series of images on one side of the company and passing them according to company policy isn't the same person or next desk of someone receiving an email saying "I'm sending you child porn". I think people may be ascribing to Facebook a sort of personhood and accompanying nuance that isn't really appropriate for a giant corporation. Bringing in the police seems absolutely the correct thing to do to me. The police can say whether something should be taken further, consider context (i.e. the BBC are probably not a paedophile ring - at least now that Jimmy Saville is dead). It's not like Facebook are attempting to stitch up the BBC which is how the BBC seem to be trying to cast it. The BBC were trying to create a story. I mean, it's the BBC - that's their purpose is news and stories. This wasn't some helpful journalist acting in a private capacity to stop child porn.

So despite the emotive nature of the subject, I'm actually with the poster that called this an "own goal" for the BBC. For those who read superficially and do not consider, I'm sure the BBC look heroic and Facebook evil and tolerant of child porn. But to the majority of people, it makes the BBC sound like they're trying to set themselves up as victims. IMO.

Thats not exactly how it went down though is it?

The social network's director of policy Simon Milner agreed to be interviewed last week, on condition the BBC provided examples of the material that it had reported, but had not been removed by moderators.

The BBC did so, but was reported to the UK's National Crime Agency as a consequence.

And Facebook's statement on it:

"It is against the law for anyone to distribute images of child exploitation."

"When the BBC sent us such images we followed our industry's standard practice and reported them to Ceop [Child Exploitation & Online Protection Centre].

So they reported the BBC who they asked to send them to them for breaking the law for distributing images of child exploitation but hadn't reported the people who actually posted the pictures on FB (although they may have since or certainly the Police will have requested that information.)

 

[robgmun]

So they reported the BBC who they asked to send them to them for breaking the law for distributing images of child exploitation but hadn't reported the people who actually posted the pictures on FB (although they may have since or certainly the Police will have requested that information.)

The BBC journalist was an idiot thou, not only he downloaded the pictures (this is classed as making CP pictures!) he sent them to other people (this is classed as distribution) As said many many times in this thread, he should have sent the links, not only this wouldn't be breaking the law, it would have been also in context of what needed to be alerted to in Facebook. He got himself into trouble and he had only himself to blame, as the police loves to say in these type of cases, ignorance isn't an excuse.

 

[Dis86]

The BBC journalist was an idiot thou, not only he downloaded the pictures (this is classed as making CP pictures!) he sent them to other people (this is classed as distribution) As said many many times in this thread, he should have sent the links, not only this wouldn't be breaking the law, it would have been also in context of what needed to be alerted to in Facebook. He got himself into trouble and he had only himself to blame, as the police loves to say in these type of cases, ignorance isn't an excuse.

I think he was trying to make the point though that Facebook had clearly deemed these pictures as acceptable so therefore handling them was fine. Whilst knowing full well they weren't.
He made a good point very badly. However Facebook are the ones ultimately in the wrong here. They can't have possession of something and say it's fine only to then report someone else for possessing the same images. That's just pure hypocrisy.

 

[Greebo]

The BBC journalist was an idiot thou, not only he downloaded the pictures (this is classed as making CP pictures!) he sent them to other people (this is classed as distribution) As said many many times in this thread, he should have sent the links, not only this wouldn't be breaking the law, it would have been also in context of what needed to be alerted to in Facebook. He got himself into trouble and he had only himself to blame, as the police loves to say in these type of cases, ignorance isn't an excuse.

Oh I agree he was an idiot and should have just sent the links, its not like FB couldnt have accessed closed groups internally. But FB isnt squeeky clean as afterall all, all 82 pics had passed their "strict" policy and was suitable for publishing on FB and had been checked by a person.

I suspect it will be like Tinder and the people sat there will swipe left or right and expected to process hundreds of pics per hour

 

[robgmun]

I think he was trying to make the point though that Facebook had clearly deemed these pictures as acceptable so therefore handling them was fine. Whilst knowing full well they weren't.
He made a good point very badly. However Facebook are the ones ultimately in the wrong here. They can't have possession of something and say it's fine only to then report someone else for possessing the same images. That's just pure hypocrisy.

We don't know what pictures that were sent, maybe amongst the ones sent out was one that was genuine CP that wasn't cleared by FB yet. It wasn't his job to monitor the pictures in FB and deem one to be acceptable or not. FB would haven't had a choice in the matter if one or two pictures was suspect. If he was reported for young teenagers in bikinis then you'd be right. But i suspect that wasn't the case here

 

[h4rm0ny]

I think he was trying to make the point though that Facebook had clearly deemed these pictures as acceptable so therefore handling them was fine. Whilst knowing full well they weren't.

Which brings us right back to what I said which is that people are treating Facebook as a person rather than a huge collection of disparate people and policies. Is it hypocrisy if a person tells you they think a photo they have isn't child porn and then reports you when you send them a copy of that same photo? Probably. Is it hypocrisy when someone out of thousands at a company thinks something isn't and then later on someone else receives stuff stating explicitly "I am sending you child porn" and follows company policy and forwards it to the police? I don't think so. You're probably about to respond that then the person at Facebook shouldn't have told the BBC journalist to send them the images, but did they? I think far more likely and from what I can tell, they wanted links to what is on their site. Certainly that would make more sense in context. And the idiot government that set all these laws made them, iirc, have mandatory punishments. I.e. no room for intent or circumstances, they're absolute laws (are these ever a good idea?). So I think there's a good chance that if someone - anyone! - emails Facebook a bunch of images they call child porn, Facebook are pretty much obliged to notify the police. And frankly, they're right to anyway. Notifying the police isn't a sentence. It's getting them involved which is the right thing to do. The police can provide expertise. They can also check whether this is something they're already aware of and monitoring which might be very important.

Honestly, I'm seeing a lot of weasel wording by the BBC, here.

 

[robgmun]

Spot on h4rm0ny, hit the nail on the head there. I also wouldn't be surprised if all hand ringing from the BBC is originally over fairly innocuous pictures of teenage girls in skimpy clothes and the BBC brands this as CP rather than real CP which would be extremely rare on a public site on the internet and would be quickly taken down and reported.

I also wouldn't be surprised if the journalist planted a real CP picture amongst the pictures sent to them to panic FB into action and instead this is what got them reported to the police.

 

[Vonhelmet]

Spot on h4rm0ny, hit the nail on the head there. I also wouldn't be surprised if all hand ringing from the BBC is originally over fairly innocuous pictures of teenage girls in skimpy clothes and the BBC brands this as CP rather than real CP which would be extremely rare on a public site on the internet and would be quickly taken down and reported.

I also wouldn't be surprised if the journalist planted a real CP picture amongst the pictures sent to them to panic FB into action and instead this is what got them reported to the police.

Conspiracy theory nonsense a go go.

 

[Dis86]

I also wouldn't be surprised if the journalist planted a real CP picture amongst the pictures sent to them to panic FB into action and instead this is what got them reported to the police.

That's a massive allegation to make. Sounds like the kind of stupid unfounded crap Asim normally comes out with!

 

[Greebo]

Spot on h4rm0ny, hit the nail on the head there. I also wouldn't be surprised if all hand ringing from the BBC is originally over fairly innocuous pictures of teenage girls in skimpy clothes and the BBC brands this as CP rather than real CP which would be extremely rare on a public site on the internet and would be quickly taken down and reported.

I also wouldn't be surprised if the journalist planted a real CP picture amongst the pictures sent to them to panic FB into action and instead this is what got them reported to the police.

I really doubt they would need to as with billions of people posting pics every day to FB I bet almost everybody on here could go and find one within one hour on FB. And that is one hell of an allegation to make. I presume the reporter went out and actually abused a child to get that picture did he as well?

 

[robgmun]

Didn't say he did it, just saying it was a possibility, seeing we don't know any detail of what went on, no one is wrong in this thread as to why he was reported. Could be many things. Like i said he wouldn't have been reported if it was typical teenager in skimpy outfit that you can google in seconds.

it makes no sense for FB to report him in that case, then suddenly they get sent a CP picture that's worth reporting? I'm just spitballing here, but something fishy here going on from the BBC side

 

[Dis86]

Didn't say he did it, just saying it was a possibility, seeing we don't know any detail of what went on, no one is wrong in this thread as to why he was reported. Could be many things. Like i said he wouldn't have been reported if it was typical teenager in skimpy outfit that you can google in seconds.

it makes no sense for FB to report him in that case, then suddenly they get sent a CP picture that's worth reporting? I'm just spitballing here, but something fishy here going on from the BBC side

And he could be a giant lizard bird too...

 

[Greebo]

Didn't say he did it, just saying it was a possibility, seeing we don't know any detail of what went on, no one is wrong in this thread as to why he was reported. Could be many things. Like i said he wouldn't have been reported if it was typical teenager in skimpy outfit that you can google in seconds.

it makes no sense for FB to report him in that case, then suddenly they get sent a CP picture that's worth reporting? I'm just spitballing here, but something fishy here going on from the BBC side

Whats fishy from the BBC side is clearly they were angling for a story about how rubbish FB checks are (which clearly they are) and the had missed a screenshot from a child abuse video and passed it in their checks along with other less obvious pics which the BBC saw differently.

The BBC should have sent all 100 pics to the Police from day one rather than even tag them for review by FB in the first place but that wasn't the story the BBC was after.

As others have said, even if asked by the picture hosting company to send the CP pics, the journalist shouldn't have as he will have broken the law.

I do think, if the BBC details are correct, that there is the bigger issue of their being closed groups on FB with titles which make it obvious what they are about and offenders using those groups sharing pictures.

 

[enkoda]

Which brings us right back to what I said which is that people are treating Facebook as a person rather than a huge collection of disparate people and policies. Is it hypocrisy if a person tells you they think a photo they have isn't child porn and then reports you when you send them a copy of that same photo? Probably. Is it hypocrisy when someone out of thousands at a company thinks something isn't and then later on someone else receives stuff stating explicitly "I am sending you child porn" and follows company policy and forwards it to the police? I don't think so. You're probably about to respond that then the person at Facebook shouldn't have told the BBC journalist to send them the images, but did they? I think far more likely and from what I can tell, they wanted links to what is on their site. Certainly that would make more sense in context. And the idiot government that set all these laws made them, iirc, have mandatory punishments. I.e. no room for intent or circumstances, they're absolute laws (are these ever a good idea?). So I think there's a good chance that if someone - anyone! - emails Facebook a bunch of images they call child porn, Facebook are pretty much obliged to notify the police. And frankly, they're right to anyway. Notifying the police isn't a sentence. It's getting them involved which is the right thing to do. The police can provide expertise. They can also check whether this is something they're already aware of and monitoring which might be very important.

Honestly, I'm seeing a lot of weasel wording by the BBC, here.

Quotes from the article:

To test Facebook's claim, the BBC used the report button to alert the company to 100 images which appeared to break its guidelines. They included:

• pages explicitly for men with a sexual interest in children
• images of under-16s in highly sexualised poses, with obscene comments posted beside them
• groups with names such as "hot xxxx schoolgirls" containing stolen images of real children
• an image that appeared to be a still from a video of child abuse, with a request below it to share "child pornography"

Of the 100 images only 18 were removed.

According to Facebook's automated replies, the other 82 did not breach "community standards". They included the apparent freeze frame. [*can't quote image*]

Image caption Some group members used an acronym to refer to "child porn"
Facebook's rules forbid convicted sex offenders from having accounts.

But the BBC found five convicted paedophiles with profiles, and reported them to Facebook via its own system. None of them were taken down.

Complaints were made and Facebook failed to take appropriate action. It isn't like they are pleading ignorance over the content being distributed on their network, they were notified and chose to allow those images and comments to remain.

Facebook later provided a statement.

"We have carefully reviewed the content referred to us and have now removed all items that were illegal or against our standards," it said.

So the remaining 82 images that Facebook initially claimed did not breach community standards were subsequently found to breach those standards or were illegal.