Facebook Live Atrocities
Facebook Live Atrocities refer to the disturbing incidents of violence and criminal acts broadcasted on Facebook Live, a live streaming feature launched by Facebook in April 2016. The platform allows users to share real-time video content with their followers, which has led to several high-profile and tragic events being streamed live. Notable incidents include the live streaming of the aftermath of police shooting Philando Castile, a murder by Steve Stephens, and various suicides and assaults, some of which have been labeled hate crimes. These events have sparked intense debates surrounding the responsibilities of social media platforms in monitoring content and the ethical implications of live streaming.
Despite Facebook's efforts, including the introduction of suicide prevention tools and hiring additional content moderators, challenges remain in effectively managing the potential for harm in unfiltered live broadcasts. The company continues to face criticism for its responses to such atrocities and the inadequacy of its monitoring systems. The ongoing occurrences of violence streamed on the platform highlight the complex intersection of technology, mental health, and public safety in the digital age.
Subject Terms
Facebook Live Atrocities
Date: April 2016–present
Place: Facebook’s livestreaming platform
Summary
Facebook is the largest social network in the world, with over three billion monthly active users as of 2023. Since Facebook Live became available to all users in April of 2016, there have been numerous violent acts, including murders and incitements to terrorism, broadcast on the platform.
Key Events
- April 2016—Facebook Live, available to iPhone users since January, becomes available on all web-enabled devices.
- July 2016—The girlfriend of Philando Castile takes to Facebook Live to show the aftermath of his shooting by a Minneapolis police officer.
- June 13, 2016—A French ISIS supporter, Larossi Abballa, murders a police officer and his domestic partner outside Paris and then turns to Facebook Live to call for further attacks before being killed by police.
- October 10, 2016—A Turkish twenty-two-year-old, Erdogan Ceren, commits suicide by shooting himself on Facebook Live after his girlfriend broke up with him.
- January 3, 2017—Four people savagely beat an eighteen-year-old man with special needs while denouncing Donald Trump during a half-hour-long Facebook Live stream.
- January 21, 2017—Three men are arrested in Sweden after allegedly gang-raping a woman and streaming the assault on Facebook Live.
- March 2017—Facebook launches in-app suicide prevention tools that enable users to report suicidal behavior in a Facebook Live stream, triggering a set of resources to appear to the person streaming.
- April 16, 2017—Steve Stephens, a thirty-seven-year-old man from Cleveland, Ohio, shoots and kills seventy-four-year-old Robert Godwin Sr. on the sidewalk, apparently at random. He then uploads a video of the killing to Facebook and streams a live confession.
- June 2022—A man in Ypsilanti, Michigan, is murdered on Facebook Live by another man upset by his online comments.
Status
Two days after the Godwin murder, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg acknowledged the event at the annual Facebook F8 developers’ conference, saying the company would “keep doing all we can to prevent tragedies like this from happening.” In May 2017, Zuckerberg announced the company would add 3,000 people to the 4,500 already on its global community operations team, which reviews reports of inappropriate content. Artificial intelligence is also a major part of the company’s strategy for automatically detecting and removing content that violates its terms of use, which include prohibitions on content that glorifies violence or criminal acts. However, the company has acknowledged it faces a steep technological challenge in controlling violent content on Facebook Live, which was designed to be unfiltered. Still, atrocities continue to be committed on Facebook Live.
In-Depth Overview
In 2016, Facebook, the world’s most popular social network, launched a service called Facebook Live that allowed live streaming of video to a user’s profile. The live streaming service is a major part of the company’s business strategy, intended, like the rest of the site, to connect people across great distances and allow them to share intimate moments in their lives. However, the wider significance of the service became apparent by July 2016 in the United States, when the girlfriend of Philando Castile live-streamed the immediate aftermath of his fatal shooting by a police officer outside St. Paul, Minnesota, as Castile reached for his wallet, further inflaming national debates about police violence. In addition, Facebook users have, on numerous occasions, used Facebook Live to broadcast videos of assaults, murders, suicides, and other atrocities, touching off a debate about uncensored streaming videos on the Internet.
In June 2017, just two months after the platform was made available to all users, a French supporter of the ISIS terrorist organization named Larossi Abballa murdered a police officer and his partner and then took their three-year-old child hostage in their home outside Paris. After the slayings, and while he still had the child, Abballa broadcasted a twelve-minute-long Facebook Live video encouraging viewers to follow his example and kill state workers and journalists. Abballa was then killed by police. His video was quickly removed, but Facebook faced criticism for the lack of monitoring when it came to live feeds. In response, the company announced it would expand its team that keeps track of live videos and responds to reports of inappropriate content.
Suicides on Facebook Live have been another problem. Only one of a number of examples occurred on October 10, 2016, when a young Turkish man, anguished by a breakup, started a Facebook Live stream in which he shot himself with a shotgun. Facebook was again criticized for its slow response to taking the video off of the site. By March of 2017, Facebook had launched an in-app service for reporting suicide risks. The service then provides the user in question with suicide prevention resources.
In January 2017, a Facebook Live video showing two men and two women assaulting a disabled man in Chicago made headlines. The disturbing video, which lasted half an hour, depicted the four attackers kicking, punching, and cutting the victim while yelling obscenities about President Donald Trump and White people. The four were charged with hate crimes, kidnapping, and assault.
Perhaps the most infamous Facebook Live atrocity occurred on April 17, 2017. Steve Stephens, age thirty-seven, approached Robert Godwin Sr. on a Cleveland sidewalk and filmed himself demanding that Godwin speak the name of Stephens’s former girlfriend before shooting and killing Godwin. Stevens then uploaded the video of the killing to Facebook, where it stayed up for over three hours. After the attack, Stephens streamed a live video explaining his reasons for committing the crime. Police later caught up with Stephens in Erie, Pennsylvania, where he shot himself.
Facebook is not the only Internet live streaming service, but it is by far the largest, and live Internet video is not subject to the kind of federal regulation that governs television broadcasting. This leaves the company itself to determine how to control video content, either by human or automated means.
Despite hiring more staff and attempting to put safeguards in place, the unpredictable nature of live-streaming Internet continued to produce precarious situations for the world to see. In 2022, a Michigan man was murdered by another man on Facebook Live. The murderer was upset with the other man for comments he had made online. These continuous and unfortunate instances bring into play the moral and ethical implications of social media and live-streaming.
Key Figures
Mark Zuckerberg: Facebook founder and CEO
Bibliography
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Yan, H., & Simon, D. (2017, April 18). Cleveland murder suspect Steve Stephens kills himself after pursuit. CNN. Retrieved from http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/18/us/cleveland-facebook-killing-video/index.html