PUTRAJAYA – Putrajaya has requested tech giant Meta to notify the government of changes to its social media platforms’ community guidelines, said Communications Minister Fahmi Fadzil.
The request, Fahmi said, is due to how Meta representatives had previously informed the government that its community guidelines, particularly for Facebook, are constantly being modified or improved.
“This means that whatever we discussed or were informed of yesterday could be changed the following day,” Fahmi, who is also the government’s spokesman, told a press conference at his ministry’s complex here today.
“As such, we asked (Meta) to provide us with information (on amendments to its community guidelines) if there is anything that (the government), especially the Prime Minister’s Office, should be made to understand.”
Fahmi also said that Meta had previously agreed to reverse its ban on the Arabic word “shahid”, meaning martyr, after discussions involving representatives from the Asian and Middle Eastern regions.
“We also asked Meta if their moderation actions are executed by staffers who can speak in Bahasa Malaysia since postings by our ministers, the Selangor menteri besar and many more are normally in Bahasa Malaysia.
“However, (Meta) did not respond directly. Instead, they said that some of their moderator employees are able to speak Bahasa Malaysia while some content was removed from their social media platforms through artificial intelligence,” he added.
Commenting on his recent engagement with Meta regarding the removal of Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim’s social media posts featuring slain Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Fahmi said the global platform provider’s representatives were “ill-prepared” to address Putrajaya’s concerns.
Fahmi said that the representatives had failed to bring along any documents relating to the repeated removal of posts, nor were they able to provide satisfactory answers on the matter.
“When (Meta figures) were asked about three removed postings, including one from May, they informed that they were not aware of the issue.
“I came to a conclusion that they were not prepared for the meeting,” Fahmi said, adding, however, that Meta had iterated its commitment to prevent similar incidents in the future.
He also said that while the meeting did not yield conclusive information on why the posts in question were taken down, Meta had expressed its readiness to continue discussions as well as provide and receive feedback.
Meta has since apologised for removing Anwar’s post on Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Iran on July 31.
The posts have been reinstated, but with a content warning. – August 7, 2024