How social media platforms should tackle online hate

Charities Against Hate (CAH), a coalition of more than 40 leading charities, has urged social media platforms to provide quicker and greater support to individuals experiencing severe or sustained hate online. The call was one of 16 recommendations made by CAH with the aim of tackling online abuse.

Along with quicker access to support, CAH suggests, among other things, that social media platforms:

• consider stricter penalties and lifetime bans far earlier than at present
• stop amplifying groups that spread hate, misinformation, or violent conspiracies
• collaborate across platforms to tackle damaging content
• commit to tackling online abuse and hate as an ongoing, long-term process

The recommendations also suggest that social media platforms should investigate how their own staff are affected by moderating hateful and harmful content, and that charities could provide mental health support and resources for such individuals.

The recommendations arrive as the UK government aims to introduce the Online Safety Bill later in 2021. The Bill will establish more regulation for social media platforms, but CAH has expressed concern that the Bill may not do enough to protect the most vulnerable.

Aisling Green, Digital Marketing Strategy Manager at Parkinson’s UK, who lead the CAH’s Product Recommendations group, said: “Social media plays an increasingly important and often positive role in our lives. But platforms are miles behind other companies in supporting people who are harmed or put in danger in the course of using a company’s products.”

Lydia Morgan, Participation Manager at Young Women’s Trust, who leads CAH’s Lived Experience group, said: “It has been awful to hear just how much people’s mental health, wellbeing, and confidence has been impacted by being subjected to hate online, and seeing hate being directed at others. We’ve also found that people often don’t report it, because they don’t have any confidence that they would be taken seriously or that they’d receive any support.

“If the sort of hate we see on social platforms were happening on the street, it would be unacceptable, so why do we let it happen through some of the world’s biggest companies?”

Charities Against Hate, which was formed in summer 2020 in response to growing concerns about the spread of online hate, has created a toolkit to enable people who have experienced hate online, and other campaign supporters, to write to their MP.