months, it came to be used as a key channel to alert the company to emerging concerns, as activists could find no other way of raising emergency situations.265 In the first week of July 2014, tensions were rising in Mandalay as rumours were spreading on Facebook blaming two Muslim men for the rape of a young Buddhist woman. According to one report, “[i]n the days leading up to the riots, NGO workers tried to warn the company in the private Facebook group, but they hadn’t heard back from anyone. Now people were getting killed, and there was still no response”. 266 The Myanmar authorities blocked Facebook on the third day of the riots. According to Matt Schissler, when he reached out to a Meta contact about this, he received an immediate response – in contrast to the nonresponse to earlier concerns that people were being killed.267 In June 2014, Al Jazeera published an article entitled, “Facebook in Myanmar: Amplifying hate speech?”. A Meta spokesperson contributed to the article.268 In July 2014, following the Mandalay riots and the authorities’ move to block the platform, a Meta representative flew into Myanmar to take part in a panel discussion at the invitation of the Myanmar government.269 The representative also conducted meetings with civil society activists during her visit.270 Following these meetings, Meta took some minor steps aimed at responding to the concerns raised by civil society – namely by issuing a Burmese-language translation of its community standards, and by supporting a civil society-led ‘flower speech’ sticker, which was intended to be used by users in Myanmar to counter content that incited violence and discrimination.271 See Section 6.3 on the unintended effects of these stickers on the amplification of harmful content. On 17 March 2015, Matt Schissler travelled to California and made a presentation at Meta headquarters aimed at raising awareness within the company of the risk that Meta could contribute to anti-Muslim violence in Myanmar. Schissler shared “a PowerPoint presentation that documented the seriousness of what was happening in Myanmar: hate speech on Facebook was leading to real-world violence in the country, and it was getting people killed”.272 Schissler had a lunch meeting with a smaller group of Meta staff after the presentation. During the lunch, one employee asked Schissler if he thought Facebook could contribute to a genocide in Myanmar, to which he responded that yes, it was a real possibility. 273 In May 2015, David Madden, the founder of the Phandeeyar foundation, made a presentation at Meta headquarters in Menlo Park, the purpose of which was “to try to help people understand what was going on, help Facebook decision makers understand what was going on in Myanmar at the time, and just how dangerous the situation was”.274 Madden told Amnesty International that “those of us who were working on these issues in Myanmar had a sense that people in Facebook didn’t appreciate the nature of the political situation in the country”.275 During this presentation, attended by relevant Meta staff in person and via videoconference, Madden cited “examples of the kinds of content that we had already seen on Facebook that was being used to exacerbate divisions between communities and to ratchet up the temperature”.276 Madden provided explicit warnings that Meta risked contributing to mass violence in Myanmar: “I drew the analogy with what had happened in Rwanda. There had been genocide in Rwanda, and radios had played a really key role in the execution of this genocide in Rwanda. And my concern was that Facebook would play a similar role in Myanmar, meaning it would be the platform through which hate speech was spread and incitements to violence were made. Briefing deck by Victoire Rio and Htaike Htaike Aung, 13 June 2022. Upcoming release on Myanmar Internet Project, myanmarinternet.info. 265 266 Sheera Frenkel & Cecilia Kang, An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination, 2021, p. 190. 267 Sheera Frenkel & Cecilia Kang, An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination, 2021, p. 190. Hereward Holland, “Facebook in Myanmar: Amplifying hate speech?”, June 2014, Al Jazeera, https://www.aljazeera.com/features/2014/6/14/facebook-in-myanmar-amplifying-hate-speech 268 See: Aung Kyaw Zaw, “2-1 U Htin Aung Hlaing Discussion Partner by U Chit Htun Phe Alexander Long MIa Garlick John Karr”, YouTube, youtube.com/watch?v=R32WQNbKyk4&ab_channel=AungKyawZaw 269 Briefing deck by Victoire Rio and Htaike Htaike Aung, 13 June 2022. Upcoming release on Myanmar Internet Project, myanmarinternet.info. 270 271 See: “Support Panzagar: End Hate Speech with Flower Speech”, Facebook Page, facebook.com/supportflowerspeech 272 Sheera Frenkel & Cecilia Kang, An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination, 2021 p. 193. 273 Sheera Frenkel & Cecilia Kang, An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination, 2021, p. 193. 274 PBS Frontline, The Facebook Dilemma, 19 June 2018, pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/interview/david-madden 275 Interview by video call with David Madden, 09 June 2022. 276 Interview by video call with David Madden, 09 June 2022. THE SOCIAL ATROCITY META AND THE RIGHT TO REMEDY FOR THE ROHINGYA Amnesty International 52