Police, military protest closure of FB accounts

THE military has expressed its disappointment over the decision of Facebook (FB) to shut down the page of the “Hands Off Our Children,” HOOC, which, it said, was a legitimate and anti-violent extremism campaign account.

Facebook disclosed that it had taken down HOOC’S page along with more than 150 other pages, accounts and groups which are linked to Filipino military and police officials allegedly for misleading people by engaging in malicious behavior.

It had also shut down FB accounts originating from China, which, it said, are allegedly promoting President Duterte and the supposed presidential ambitions of his daughter, Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-carpio.

“The Armed Forces of the Philippines [AFP] regrets the decision of Facebook to take down the page of Hands Off Our Children, a campaign launched by a group of parents who are fighting to protect their children against violent extremism,” said chief of staff Lt. Gen. Gilbert Gapay.

“Their grievances are legitimate, and their calls urgent. The recruitment machinery of the communist terrorist group has long been found to victimize students, conditioning them to become cadres and armed members of the New People’s Army,” he stressed.

FB said the accounts, which also included the military’s Kalinaw News, were engaged in “coordinated inauthentic behavior,” which gave rise to violations, including the red tagging of human-rights defenders, peace advocates and even journalists.

Gapay said HOOC’S page was instrumental to the group’s campaign to raise awareness on the vulnerability of children at the hands of communist front organizations.

“Its arbitrary shutdown adds to the limited spaces afforded to them and the unsympathetic ears of some sectors,” he said.

Gapay’s statement followed an earlier scheduled meeting between the military and FB officials led by their Philippines’s public policy head Clare Amador to discuss possible partnership in preventing terrorists’ exploitation of the Internet.

Amador and her team reached out to Gapay in August to set the virtual courtesy call and share FB’S global efforts to counterterrorism and in dealing with “harmful” content on the platform.

FB is a member of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism (GIFCT) which was established in 2017 and is now a consortium of companies dedicated to disrupting terrorist abuse of members’ digital platforms.

At the Philippine National Police, its spokesman Col. Ysmael Yu, said they would continue to adhere to the PNP’S institutional policy that promotes observance of cyber etiquette and proper decorum in all public engagements, including social-media platforms, chatgroups and private sites.

“We recognize social media as an effective tool that technology can offer, especially at this period of health emergency, to establish proactive information and awareness activities, as well as to build harmonious relationship with the community. As far as we are concerned, official Facebook pages of the PNP and those of our lower units remain compliant with standards and continue to serve its purpose along these objectives,” he said.

Yu said “all comments and opinions of individual personnel, associations and sectoral groups on matters that are not related to the organization’s activities are hereby disowned by the PNP as unofficial and unauthorized.”

The PNP spokesman said they respect the action taken by Facebook on what it perceived as violations of its terms of use.