CAN’T LIKE THAT
Fighting Facebook’s pedo problem
Dear John: I just read your recent article about Facebook’s pedophile problem.
It is worse than ever! Many of us concerned Facebook users report the pedophile pages, profiles and groups to the company, but nine times out of 10, it does nothing. Here we are, doing its job of rounding up the pedos, and seldom will it do anything.
Last week, I saw real hardcore child rape (aka porn) on FB. Traumatizing. FB took it down, but still.
Today, at least 12 of us reported a close-cropped photo of a fully nude bottom — most likely a child’s, since it was on a boy-lover’s group. A public group, mind you!
Anyone can see without joining. FB explicitly says that fully naked bottoms violate the nudity rule, but FB will not take it down, saying it doesn’t violate the rules. Frustrating.
There are many of us who beg FB to create a pedophile report button, to no avail.
I came across another pedo profile today that featured a young girl with her mouth and arms completely ducttaped. It looks like real and actual abuse, not some kids’ game. When I went to report it, there is NO button to re- port child endangerment. She wasn’t nude. I had to use the “inappropriate, annoying or I don’t like it” button. FB doesn’t even have a button for reporting serious abuse or crimes.
OK, you’re probably sick of my examples, but I wanted to give you a snapshot of what we are dealing with. Tell me, John, what can we do? I’ve got people ready to take action. J.S.
Dear J.S.: The problem is, you are calling the wrong company. You are calling Facebook, which is either unwilling or unable to do anything.
You should be calling Facebook’s advertisers. You’ll be surprised how quickly Facebook will respond when it’s going lose money and — worse — when Wall Street might start punishing its stock because advertising revenue is going down.
The column I wrote a couple of weeks back explained how I used this tactic years ago when Facebook wouldn’t take my complaints seriously. Suddenly, the company woke up to the problem and started policing itself better.
I guess Facebook has forgotten how worried it was about my — and some others’ — pleas to advertisers. If it’s really as bad as you say, then it needs another lesson — this time by you and whatever group you can muster.
My suggestion: Take screen shots of advertisements on pages that are inappropriate for their product. Companies that sell family vacations and family products don’t want to be on the pages you just described. Same with sporting goods, TV companies, consumer products — hell, I can’t think of any company that would want to be on those pages.
Google recently had a problem like this with advertisers who were finding their ads on inap- propriate pages. And it became a major story.
Facebook and Google will just have to try harder to get rid of these inappropriate users.
If what you are saying is true, what is a “boy-lover’s group” doing with a page on Facebook anyway?
Let me know how you make out.