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Call For Tech Giants To Face Taxes Over Extremist Content (bbc.com)

Posted by msmash on from the that's-one-way-to-do-it dept.

Internet companies should face a tax punishment for failing to deal with the threat of terrorism in the UK, security minister Ben Wallace has said. From a report: Mr Wallace said firms such as Facebook, Google and YouTube were too slow to remove radical content online, forcing the government to act instead. While tech firms were "ruthless profiteers," governments were spending millions policing the web, he added. Facebook said Mr Wallace was wrong to say it put profits before safety. YouTube said violent extremism was a "complex problem" and addressing it was a "critical challenge for us all." In an interview with the Sunday Times, Mr Wallace said tech giants were failing to help prevent the radicalisation of people online. "Because content is not taken down as quickly as they could do," he claimed, "we're having to de-radicalise people who have been radicalised. That's costing millions."

11 of 179 comments (clear)

  1. AKA Censorship by Paleolibertarian · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Threatening content providers with SPECIAL tax treatment if they have the wrong content is censorship plain and simple.

    1. Re:AKA Censorship by arth1 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Sure it's censorship. That's the whole point of it. The big difference between many European countries and the US is that they are more open about doing censorship when deemed beneficial for society as a whole. WWII happened on their own soil, and they want to take steps to prevent it from happening again.

      But most Americans appear to be for censorship as long as it doesn't affect them, and isn't called censorship. Suppressing science, suppressing medical information, suppressing sexuality, suppressing freethinkers, suppressing seditious speak, ... that is apparently fine. But suppressing hate speech is not?

    2. Re:AKA Censorship by mi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      WWII happened on their own soil, and they want to take steps to prevent it from happening again.

      Yes, because Hitler was such a big fan of Free Speech, that the dangerous concept must be suppressed. For the Greater Good[tm].

      Suppressing science, suppressing medical information, suppressing sexuality, suppressing freethinkers, suppressing seditious speak

      Without citations, this is all meaningless FUD.

      But suppressing hate speech is not?

      Please, cite the part of the First Amendment, which makes an exception for "hate speech" — however defined.

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    3. Re:AKA Censorship by sabri · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I guess to you hate speech is anything that goes against your personal preferences.

      Trump is an idiot but his detractors are even more offensive. Trump won the Presidency because a lot of people did not want Clinton's supporters to win. How bad does someone have to lose to Trump? Just look at all of his faults and explain how someone with more money, more political savvy, and more political experience loses to him? There is a segment of society that Clinton and her supporters underestimated. The insults and holier than thou attitude used against any non-Clinton supporter helped elect Trump. I voted against the rioters in Berkley and their kindred spirits across the country. I voted against those who want to sanitize the past and demanding reparations of some type for acts that took place hundreds of years ago. Clinton didn't turn me off it was her supporters who guided my vote.

      This. Exactly this. This is what many moderate people, moderate left and moderate right, don't seem to understand. Because both the far left and the far right are too busy screaming at each other and calling names, the moderate middle loses out. And as a result, we have a polarized electorate hating the other side. This year, many Thanksgiving dinners were ruined because of "political debate" between Trump voters and anti-Trump people.

      The whining of the far-left and the whining of the far-right need to stop. We don't need 200 different genders, and we don't need to buy an AR-15 with the same ease as a pack of laundry detergent. We don't need to force small business bakeries to bake cakes for gay couples in the same way as we don't need to ban the morning after pill.

      It's ridiculous. Live and let live, don't force your morals, religious beliefs or political opinions through someone else's throat. Is that really so fucking difficult?

      --
      I'm not a complete idiot... Some parts are missing.
  2. Treating the symptom not the cause by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Instead of censuring internet companies for being too slow to remove radical content, how about censuring the UK government for inviting millions of immigrants who had no intention of assimilating British culture?

    If those immigration officials didn't know in advance that this would result in terror attacks, they were in willful denial.

  3. And who gets to define "extremist"? by elrous0 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Because today it's terrorism, tomorrow it's someone who criticizes Islam or says that Brexit is a good thing.

    --
    SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
  4. Or we could work this ... by CaptainDork · · Score: 3, Insightful

    ... outside social media and address the root of most of the problems.

    " ... violent extremism ... " isn't a social media problem -- it's a conversation about " ... violent extremism ... " in the real world.

    Those real world problems are due to lack of diplomacy and governance and statesmanship.

    Blocking evil content does not block evil.

    --
    It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
  5. UK could help reduce radicalisation... by bagofbeans · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ...by not being a party to killing civilians in so many foreign countries.

    1. Re:UK could help reduce radicalisation... by Kernel+Kurtz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      ...by not being a party to killing civilians in so many foreign countries.

      This. The West - the US and Britain more than others, but all the collective West - obsessively meddles in other countries politics, meddles in other countries wars, arms and props up brutal dictatorships, and obviously in doing make lots and lots of enemies.

      People ask "why do they hate us?".

      I ask "what, are you fucking stupid?"

  6. "Complex problem" by 110010001000 · · Score: 1, Insightful

    The only reason that the big tech companies says it is a "complex problem" is because they don't want to hire people to review the massive amounts of drivel that gets spewed out on their website. Of course, someone will say "it is impossible" to review it all because there is "so much content", but that is baloney. You might need to hire hundreds of thousands of people to do it, but they are making billions so they could do it.

  7. Hey Wallace, how about a radical idea by Opportunist · · Score: 2, Insightful

    How about giving people no reason to become extremists? How about giving people a reason to live instead of making them susceptible to promises of a great afterlife because they notice that they can't get anywhere in this life because everywhere they look they see a dead end?

    No, that's unpossible, right? That would cut into the bottom line of the people paying you, you old ho!

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.