Facebook's Bizarre and Secretive 'Graphic Content' Policy Revealed in Leaked Document - Mail Online

Facebook's bizarre and secretive 'graphic content' policy revealed in leak...
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No sex, but crushed heads are OK. Leaked Facebook document reveals website's secretive and bizarre 'graphic content' policy
By Daily Mail Reporter UPDATED: 00:56 GMT, 22 February 2012
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A former employee who used to filter out offensive content on Facebook has leaked the website's secret rulebook, which gives astonishingly detailed instructions that include blocking mild nudity but allowing images of death and disfigurement, as well as racially charged comments. An aggrieved Moroccan worker who was paid a mere $1 an hour by oDesk - a third-party content-moderation firm used by Facebook - revealed it tells staff to delete all forms of sexual activity, even simulated activity where there was nothing explicit on show. Yet deep wounds, excessive blood and 'crushed heads, limbs etc' are allowed - 'as long as no insides are showing'.
The rules: An astonishingly detailed cheat sheet of what Facebook thinks is graphic content is handed to employees of content moderation firm oDesk. Disgruntled employee Amine
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Derkaoui leaked the document to Gawker.com
The staff working for oDesk are further instructed that Facebook will not condone 'slurs or racial comments of any kind', and that any such comments should be deleted as soon as possible. However, they should be allowed to stay online if the comments are made in a humourous or ironic way. Moroccan-born Amine Derkaoui, 21, left oDesk and is clearly still very mad at his former employers and Facebook. He began training with oDesk as a moderator but missed a crucial test because of Ramadan and eventually left to become a content manager for a New York-based tech company. In an interview with U.S. gossip website Gawker.com, Mr Derkaoui said: 'It's humiliating. They are just exploiting the third world.' It didn't make Mr Derkaoui feel any better that Facebook just recently posted a staggering $100 billion initial public offering (IPO).
Flagged and removed: Facebook has landed in hot water in the past, having to apologise for removing a gay kiss scene from British soap opera EastEnders, above left, and being left embarrassed when they took down a relatively innocuous line drawing of a topless woman from artist Steven Assael
The 'cheat sheet' of rules are part of a larger 17-page guidebook given to oDesk by Facebook, providing advice for employees on what to do when screening photographs, text and videos that have been 'flagged' for removal by one of Facebooks 850 million users. Facebook runs community guidelines on its own site, but they are perhaps purposefully vague when compared to the crystal clear instructions given to oDesk employees. Online, Facebook says that it wants to share people's lives, but draws the line at 'inappropriately graphic content' - leaving the user to draw his or her conclusions as to what is considered too graphic. At oDesk, nothing is left to the imagination. Urine, faeces, vomit, semen and - strangely - ear wax are not allowed.
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'Lactivists': Mothers and supporters gathered outside the Facebook offices in Austin, Texas, to protest Facebook's decision to persistently remove pictures of breastfeeding mothers from its site
'Versus photos' - where users are asked to rate photos of people set side-by-side - are also prohibited, as are pictures of unconscious or sleeping drunk people with 'things drawn on their faces'. Yet it is acceptable to leave up footage of children physically assaulting each other at school (unless 'the video has been posted to continue tormenting the person targeted in the video'). Showing perhaps that the Facebook HQ is in California, depictions or text of illegal drug use must be deleted - unless it's about marijuana. Even so, marijuana enthusiasts should be removed if it is 'clear that the poster is selling/buying/growing'.
Secretive: Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, seen here at the Dallas Mavericks and New York Knicks game in Madison Square Gardens, New York, has always had a secretive stance on Facebook policy
The fallout from the leak has so far been limited. Despite Facebook's secretive stance on its censorship policy, most users were more worried about the website passing their details on to third parties. It forced Facebook to issue the statement: 'In an effort to quickly and efficiently process the millions of reports we receive every day, we have found it
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helpful to contract third parties to provide precursory classification of a small proportion of reported content. 'These contractors are subject to rigorous quality controls and we have implemented several layers of safeguards to protect the data of those using our service.' California-based oDesk was launched full-scale in 2005 by co-founders Odysseas Tsatalos and Stratis Karamanlakis. It provides content moderation services to Google and Facebook, Wikipedia and AOL. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Facebook isn't mentioned on oDesk's back-patting website. A team of about 50 people from all over the third world - Mexico, Turkey, India and the Philippines - working to moderate Facebook content. Mr Derkaoui said they worked from home and in 4-hour shifts for $1 per hour plus commissions (which took them marginally higher to around $4 per hour). Mr Derkaoui said there was no mention of Facebook when he was applying for his job and his managers at oDesk never explicitly said the social networking site was their client.
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Comments (57)
Newest Oldest Best rated Worst rated View all Look at the lower right part of the rule's picture "IP blocks and International..." It mentions Kurdistan Map as one of the items that must be removed if posted on facebook 4 of the five items listed there are 'technically' against Kurds! This is sick - Rozhbaiany , Kirkuk, Kurdistan, 22/2/2012 22:43 Click to rate Rating 35
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Report abuse I have never had an interest in social media. I don't care at all. For some reason, many people think they should have the right to privacy, then they advertise their lives over the internet. I think that is somewhat narcissitic and illogical, wouldn't you agree? I think the media and the TV have a lot to do with people acting this way. Guess what?! No matter how important you think you are or how many "likes" you received, you are insignificant. We all are. Even Tony Blair. Even..dare I say it, Obama. I think we should all take a good look in the mirror and ask ourselves why we Westerners behave like complete hypocrites and morons. The sooner you turn off your propaganda TV the sooner you realize you are not a creep like those people on TV. - i love Mr. Pickles , CA USA, 22/2/2012 22:26 Click to rate Report abuse I think we are witnesesing the long slow death of facebook, don't worry the CIA will come up with a new way for you to tell them exaclty what you are up to and with whom. - Chewy , Up in the Clouds proving we are alone! , 22/2/2012 12:28 Click to rate Report abuse I'm glad I shut my account down a while back. If you are wise you will do the same. Even google are overstepping their mark. - chu, warks, 21/2/2012 22:25 ............... Are you sure its closed??? - Grumpy Grandpa , Livingston, 22/2/2012 11:38 Click to rate Report abuse Facebook policy clearly reflects the streaks of both puritanism and violence that are deeply ingrained in the American psyche. - Dave , Southampton. UK, 22/2/2012 10:25 Click to rate Report abuse Interesting that pictures of people Vs people are abnned as is this not how Mark Zuckerberg got into trouble in the first place when at Uni? - blackdog , Kosovo , 22/2/2012 10:12 Click to rate Report abuse Facebook (faceache, fakebook haha) is mostly inhabited by the desperately vain and the crushingly irrelevant. - Brian , haslemere, uk, 22/2/2012 09:36 Click to rate Report abuse Facebook IS creepy. Some of the stuff I've viewed and read on it. The problem, the way I see it is that no one really knows the boundaries. Some use it as a one-stop-shop for anything goes. Racist, sexist and bullying comments are made and only removed when someone complains and usually hours after the comments are made. Facebook is a fantastic idea but it needs to be extremely proactive in moderating the content. - Jon B , Manchester, 22/2/2012 09:30 Click to rate Report abuse "Slurs or racial comments of any kind" Yeah, they're really holding up that policy well. There isn't a day that goes by without seeing some racial insult or stereotype on my updates. And no my network doesn't consist of extremists! - Jeff , London, 22/2/2012 09:28 Click to rate Report abuse Reflects american sensibilities. - TedF , WsM Somerset, 22/2/2012 09:22 Click to rate Report abuse Share this comment The views expressed in the contents above are those of our users and do not necessarily reflect the views of MailOnline. Rating 31 Rating 11 Rating (0) Rating 15 Rating 10 Rating 36 Rating 39 Rating 40 Rating 2
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Facebook's Bizarre and Secretive 'Graphic Content' Policy Revealed in Leaked Document - Mail Online

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Facebook's bizarre and secretive 'graphic content' policy revealed in leak...