Clock is ticking on social media extremism, says former spy chief

WEB giants accused of doing too little to remove terrorist and extremist content have a year to reform themselves or face legislation, a former head of GCHQ has predicted.

Robert Hannigan said tech companies were becoming more powerful than governments and tended to consider themselves above democracy.

But he said he believed their window to change themselves was closing and he feared most were “missing the boat”.

He predicted that if firms do not take “credible” action by the end of 2018, governments will start to intervene.

Mr Hannigan, who retired as director of Britain’s electronic spying agency last year, also told the BBC he would be surprised if Russia had not attempted to interfere in the Brexit referendum.

Companies such as Youtube, Twitter and Facebook have received sharp criticism from politicians who have accused them of doing too little to stop their platforms from becoming safe spaces for terrorists and extremists.

The providers say they are investing heavily in people and technology to remove such content as jihadist propaganda and terror training manuals.

Mr Hannigan said: “I have always thought there is a window for them to reform themselves.

‘We don’t know [if Russia interfered over Brexit]. It would be very surprising if they hadn’t at least tried’

“The window is closing, I think, otherwise governments around the world will start legislating. That’s a shame, I think it would be much better if they reformed themselves, but I think they are probably missing the boat.”

Asked if the tech giants were more powerful than governments, he said: “You have a really good point there. They are the planet’s most wealthy organisations and they do have huge power…so yes, they are, and I think there’s a strange thing in Silicon Valley, there’s a mixture of cynicism, commercial reality of wanting to make huge profits, but also a bit of arrogance that they somehow sit above democracy.”

He said democratically elected people deciding what was appropriate for content online was “better that than some tech company bosses deciding”.

However, he added: “I think it’s reasonable to say that if they haven’t really achieved something that is credible by the end of this year, that window is going to close for them.”

Asked if he believed Russia had meddled in the Brexit referendum, he said: “The truth is we don’t really know because we don’t know what involvement there was of Russian or Russianbacked entities in advertising, for example through social media.

“It would be very surprising if they hadn’t at least tried.”