Facebook vows to restrict users if US election descends into chaos: Media

Facebook had drawn up plans for how to handle a range of outcomes. PHOTO: REUTERS

LONDON - Facebook will take aggressive measures to "restrict the circulation of content" on its platform if November's presidential election descends into chaos or violent civic unrest, the Financial Times reported on Tuesday (Sept 22) citing a company executive.

The company had drawn up plans for how to handle a range of outcomes, including widespread civic unrest or "the political dilemmas" of having in-person votes counted more rapidly than mail-in ballots, the report said, citing an interview with Mr Nick Clegg, Facebook's head of global affairs.

"There are some break-glass options available to us if there really is an extremely chaotic and, worse still, violent set of circumstances," Mr Clegg said, though he stopped short of elaborating further on what measures were on the table.

The proposed actions come as the social media group is under increasing pressure to lay out how it plans to combat election-related misinformation, voter suppression and the incitement of violence on the Nov 3 election day and during the post-election period.

It also comes as concerns mount that even United States President Donald Trump himself could take to social media to contest the result or call for violent protest, potentially triggering a constitutional crisis.

"We have acted aggressively in other parts of the world where we think that there is real civic instability and we obviously have the tools to do that (again)," Mr Clegg added, citing the previous use of "pretty exceptional measures to significantly restrict the circulation of content on our platform".

Facebook refused to go into detail over its plans for election-related content control, as malicious actors might use that information to proactively work out how to game the system, the FT said.

However, during previous periods of unrest in Sri Lanka and Myanmar, the company took action including reducing the reach of content shared by repeated rule-breakers, and limiting the distribution of "borderline content" that was sensationalist but did not quite breach its hate speech rules.

Facebook is bracing for what is likely to be a highly polarising election, and remains in the spotlight after it failed to catch attempts by Russia to manipulate the 2016 US vote.

There are fears that Mr Trump could try to interfere in the process this time, since he has already refused to commit to accepting the outcome, argued it could be rigged and sought to delegitimise postal voting.

Facebook has been exploring how to handle about 70 different potential scenarios, according to a person familiar with the situation, with staff including military scenario planners.

So far, it has announced several new election misinformation and voter suppression policies in recent weeks, including stating that it will add cautionary labels to posts in which campaigns or candidates prematurely claim victory, for example.

According to Mr Clegg, any high-stakes decisions will fall to a team of top executives including himself and chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg - with chief executive Mark Zuckerberg holding the right to overrule positions.

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