Twitter, Google not doing enough to curb extremism: UK MPs

LONDON Internet giants such as Twitter, Facebook and Google have removed hundreds of thousands of accounts linked to extremists in recent years, but an influential committee of British parliament says they are “consciously failing” to tackle extremism on the web.

In a scathing report, the Home Affairs Committee said on Thursday that between mid-2015 and February 2016, Twitter had suspended more than 125,000 accounts globally, and Google removed more than 14 million videos, but “these are in reality a drop in the ocean”.

“They must accept that the hundreds of millions in revenues generated from billions of people using their products needs to be accompanied by a greater sense of responsibility and ownership for the impact that extremist material on their sites is having,” the report said.

Committee chairman Keith Vaz said: “We are engaged in a war for hearts and minds in the fight against terrorism. The modern front line is the internet. Its forums, message boards and social media platforms are the lifeblood of Daesh and other terrorist groups for their recruitment and financing and the spread of ideology.”

He added, “Huge corporations like Google, Facebook and Twitter, with their billion dollar incomes, are consciously failing to tackle this threat and passing the buck by hiding behind their supranational legal status, despite knowing that their sites are being used by the instigators of terror.”

Vaz said even when someone is convicted, such as hate preacher Anjem Choudary, who was found guilty of supporting the Islamic State, their videos and hateful speeches continue to influence people through these websites. “The companies’ failure to tackle this threat has left some parts of the internet ungoverned, unregulated and lawless,” he said.