5/22/22, 5:59 PM How Facebook’s Rise Fueled Chaos and Confusion in Myanmar | WIRED The company, however, has failed to provide details about these monitors. Garlick declined to provide a specific number of Burmese language content reviewers, saying only that the number had increased over the years and that the company employs “dozens of reviewers now, and we are aiming to double that by the year’s end.” The company will say that is has more than 7,500 content reviewers working in over 50 languages. Asked if the company had reviewers proficient in the other languages besides Burmese that are used widely in Myanmar, a spokeswoman said only that when content is reported that is not in one of the languages covered by the company, Facebook works with people familiar with the language to determine if the content violates standards. A list of languages that the content reviewers do work in was not available, the spokeswoman said. In recent months, Facebook has taken some important steps and has acknowledged that the company can do more. In February, the company banned Wirathu, the radical monk who helped instigate the Mandalay riots. Following the pushback from civil society groups, it has taken down pages of other nationalist organizations and monks, removing major sources of hate speech and misinformation. Facebook recently posted ads for Myanmar-focused jobs, including a public policy manager, specifying that fluency in Burmese and an understanding “of the Myanmar political system” were essential skills for the Singapore-based job. It has also rolled out tools to report content on Facebook Messenger and is exploring the possibility of using AI to identify hateful content faster, a spokeswoman says. Business for Social Responsibility, a California based nonprofit organization, will soon begin a human rights impact assessment of Facebook’s role in Myanmar that will be made public when it is completed. Still the secrecy around Facebook’s operations persists. In written responses to follow-up questions from Senator Leahy, the company stuck to the familiar, evasive line. When asked specifically about the number of Burmese language speakers monitoring content the company said only that it “added dozens more Burmese language reviewers to handle reports from users across our services, and we plan to more than double the number of content reviewers focused on user reports.” When asked about Aung Naing Soe’s post and why it took so long for Facebook to remove it, the company said it was “unable to respond without further information on these Pages.” While the print-outs of the posts used by Senator Leahy were blurred to protect his identity the fact that it was Aung Naing Soe was hardly a secret. He has spoken openly to the media about his experience and was identified widely on social media. He said that no representative from the company had been in touch with him regarding the incident. Last month, a large delegation of Facebook officials made a high-profile trip to Myanmar. Lead by Simon Milner, Vice President of Public Policy for Asia-Pacific, the group met with the Ministry of Information, which suggested the company open an office in Myanmar, according to a state-media report on the meeting. A spokeswoman for Facebook said the company currently has no plans to open an office in the country and is capable of working around the clock by having teams working on Myanmar located in different time zones. The trip, which also included meetings with civil society groups, was meant to express the company’s “deep commitment to keeping the millions of people who use Facebook in Myanmar safe on our services,” Garlick says. https://www.wired.com/story/how-facebooks-rise-fueled-chaos-and-confusion-in-myanmar/ 15/16