On Friday, Malaysia said it would take legal action to fight Meta Platforms for failing to take down undesirable posts.
Last year, a tight national election led to growing ethnic tensions. Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim’s administration promised to deal with provocative posts about race and religion.
According to the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission, Facebook has recently been afflicted by a large volume of undesirable content. The posts were linked to royalty, religion, race, defamation, and impersonation.
They added that Meta did not take enough action, although it has been repeatedly requested. Besides, legal action was needed to encourage cybersecurity accountability and keep consumers safe.
However, the company did not immediately respond. Likewise, the commission did not answer what legal action would take place.
In Malaysia, race and religion are considered sensitive issues since it has a majority of Muslim ethnic Malays. Also, there are ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities there.
Additionally, comments on their revered royals are a sensitive topic for them. Posting nasty remarks about them could be tried under sedition laws.
Meta Platform’s Facebook is Malaysia’s most prominent social media platform, having 60.00% of its population. Moreover, other major social media companies like YouTube and TikTok are under regulatory inspection over posted content.
Facebook is to be Evaluated by Meta Oversight Board
The Oversight Board of Meta Platforms has asked Facebook to evaluate efforts to avoid political violence promotion. It was brought after it enabled a video call that stayed online for violent posts in the 2022 Brazilian election.
On Thursday, the board stated that the original decision was to keep the video up. It showed a Brazilian general telling people to hit the streets. The issue raised concerns about the effectiveness of their election integrity efforts.
Eventually, after letting it stay up, Meta took it down on January 20 after the board handled the case.
Furthermore, Facebook and Instagram have been used in the past for spreading misinformation and encouraging violence.
