Activists are suing Facebook and Instagram, so the company clearly communicates its rules on moderation. This is to put an end to a form of censorship with regard to complaining accounts.
In January 2021, many feminist Twitter accounts are asking "How do you get men to stop raping?" This question leads to the massive suspension of the accounts that relayed this question. This censorship is due, according to the platform to a "algorithm error". Yet encountering some form of censorship on social media is far from exceptional for these activist accounts, which have therefore decided to take legal action. Indeed, their creators denounce shifting and unclear rules of censorship. They are supported by Pisan Avocats, one of the co-founders of which, Maître Valentine Rebérioux, has agreed to answer our questions, in order to fully understand the challenges of this procedure.
The only thing that will change all this is the intervention of the legislator.
Is this procedure a first in France?
Master Valentine Rebérioux: It’s not new. There have already been some, launched by anti-racist and anti-homophobic associations. These are emergency procedures, so that a judge can force Facebook and Instagram to hand over the technical documentation on moderation to an expert. Indeed, we need this first step to understand how it works and to understand why it is such a mess. How political or feminist content is erased in a second, or threatened with deletion of accounts (if this or that post is not deleted) when, moreover, there is an outpouring of hatred on a daily basis, especially towards militant accounts that l 'we represent, who are insulted, harassed all day long, without anything happening!
So the platform rules are not clear?
This is the whole point of our procedure. For example, on nudity it is not clear: Femen are censored, when accounts with women who pose in a very lascivious, even degrading and half-naked way, are not censored: it's big n ' whatever! Is it humans or machines that censor? We do not know. In any case, there is a censorship of large and small feminist accounts that seems difficult to understand.
What would be the solutions?
We must be able to discuss with these companies by bringing everyone around the table, so that these platforms are really beneficial to all users. At one point, the only thing that will change this is the intervention of the legislator.