Trolling and cyberbullying has always existed, but because of how widespread social media has become and how easy it is for something to get picked up on go viral, it’s easy for things to get out of control. Over in Austria, it seems that the courts have decided that the companies who own these social media platforms must take some responsibility for it.
In a report from Reuters, the courts have ruled that Facebook must remove postings that are deemed as hate speech. This ruling is bigger than just Austria because the courts have ruled that the postings must be deleted across the entire social media platform and not just in Austria, meaning that this ruling has the potential to impact other countries as well.
While Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram already have tools that allow users to report posts that are offensive, there has been some who have argued that these tools aren’t enough and that social media websites aren’t working as fast or being as active when it comes to taking them down. A recent case involving the BBC and Facebook is proof of that.
The case against Facebook was originally filed by an Austrian political party last year about posts written by a fake profile about Eva Glawischnig. The party alleges that Facebook had not removed the posts despite several requests being put in to do so. Facebook has yet to comment on the ruling.