{"id":6568,"date":"2020-04-22T15:19:58","date_gmt":"2020-04-22T14:19:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/amdf-centre.org\/?p=6568"},"modified":"2026-09-18T14:16:09","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T13:16:09","slug":"covid-19-content-moderation-research-letter-to-social-media-and-content-sharing-platforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/amdf-centre.org\/2020\/04\/22\/covid-19-content-moderation-research-letter-to-social-media-and-content-sharing-platforms\/","title":{"rendered":"COVID-19 Content Moderation Letter To Social Media and Content-Sharing Platforms"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dear Social Media and Content-Sharing Platforms:<\/em><\/p>\n

As the COVID-19 pandemic spreads across the globe, the importance of your platforms and their real world impact has never been clearer. Your platforms are being used to communicate, assemble, research the virus, provide mutual aid, and more. We understand that many platforms have increased their reliance on automated content moderation during the pandemic, while simultaneously removing misinformation and apparently inaccurate information about COVID-19 at an unprecedented rate.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

The importance of accurate information during this pandemic is clear. But knowledge about the novel coronavirus is rapidly evolving. This is also an unprecedented opportunity to study how online information flows ultimately affect health outcomes, and to evaluate the macro- and micro-level consequences of relying on automation to moderate content in a complex and evolving information environment. But such studies rely on information that your companies control\u2013including information you are automatically blocking and removing from your services. It is essential that platforms preserve this data so that it can be made available to researchers and journalists and included in your transparency reports. The data will be invaluable to those working in public health, human rights, science and academia. It will be crucial to develop safeguards to address the privacy issues raised by new or longer data retention and by the sharing of information with third parties, but the need for immediate preservation is urgent.<\/em><\/p>\n

We, the undersigned organizations, institutions, and researchers, urge you to:<\/em><\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Immediately commit to preserving all data on content removal during the COVID-19 pandemic, including but not limited to information about which takedowns did not receive human review, whether users tried to appeal the takedown (when that information is available), and reports that were not acted upon.\u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n
  2. Preserve all content that the platform is automatically blocking or removing, including individual posts, videos, images, and entire accounts.<\/em><\/li>\n
  3. Produce transparency reports that include information about content blocking and removal related to COVID-19\u00a0<\/em><\/li>\n
  4. Provide access to this data in the future to researchers and journalists, recognizing that privacy will need to be ensured.<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Signed,<\/em><\/p>\n

    Organizations<\/strong><\/p>\n

    Access Now
    \nAfrica Media Development Foundation (AMDF)
    \nAlgorithmWatch
    \nARTICLE 19
    \nAssociation for Progressive Communications (APC)
    \nBalkan Investigative Reporting Network
    \nBangladesh NGOs Network for Radio & Communication
    \nCarnegie Mellon University Center for Human Rights Science
    \nCenter for Democracy & Technology
    \nCollaboration on International ICT Policy for East and Southern Africa (CIPESA)
    \nCommittee to Protect Journalists
    \nCook Islands Internet Action Group
    \nCREOpoint
    \nDangerous Speech Project
    \nDemocracy Reporting International
    \nDerechos Digitales
    \nDigital Trade and Data Governance Hub,
    \nGWU
    \nElectronic Frontier Foundation
    \nEU DisinfoLab
    \nFoundation for Media
    \nFree Press Unlimited
    \nGatef organization
    \nGlobal Forum for Media Development (GFMD)
    \nGulf Centre for Human Rights
    \nHellerstein & Associates
    \nInstitute for Strategic Dialogue
    \nInternet Sans Fronti\u00e8res
    \nIPANDETEC
    \nMediaLab ISCTE-IUL
    \nMedia Matters for Democracy
    \nMedia Monitoring Africa
    \nNew America\u2019s Open Technology Institute
    \nNew York University Stern Center for Business and Human Rights
    \nParadigm Initiative
    \nPEN America
    \nPersonalData.IO
    \nRanking Digital Rights
    \nReporters Without Borders (RSF)
    \nRNW Media
    \nSouth African National Editors Forum
    \nStiftung Neue Verantwortung (SNV)
    \nSyrian Archive
    \nTEDIC
    \nWITNESS<\/em><\/p>\n

    Individuals (Institutions listed for identification purposes)\u00a0<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

    Agustina Del Campo, Centro de Estudios en Libertad de Expresi\u00f3n y Acceso a la Informaci\u00f3n (CELE), Universidad de Palermo, Argentina
    \nAlexa Koenig, Executive Director, Human Rights Center, Berkeley Law
    \nAnthony Fargo, Center for International Media Law and Policy Studies, Indiana University
    \nDr Argyro Karanasiou, Director of LETS Lab, University of Greenwich
    \nChinmayi Arun, Resident Fellow, Information Society Project, Yale Law School
    \nClaudio Fogu, President, UCSB Faculty Association
    \nConstance Penley, University of California, Santa Barbara
    \nDamian Loreti, Lecturer Universidad de Buenos Aires \u2013 Social Sciences Fac.
    \nDaphne Keller, Stanford Cyber Policy Center
    \nDavid Morar, Visiting Scholar, GWU Elliott School, Digital Trade & Data Governance Hub
    \nDeirdre K. Mulligan, School of Information, University of California, Berkeley
    \nEileen Donahoe, Executive Director, Stanford Global Digital Policy Incubator
    \nElaine Monaghan, Professor of Practice, Journalism, Indiana University-Bloomington
    \nEllen P. Goodman, Rutgers Law
    \nEmma L. Briant, Associate Researcher at Bard College
    \nEnrique Pirac\u00e9s, Program Manager, Center for Human Rights Science, Carnegie Mellon University
    \nFilippo Menczer, Observatory on Social Media at Indiana University
    \nHannah Bloch-Wehba, Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law
    \nJay David Aronson, Professor of Science, Technology, and Society, Carnegie Mellon University
    \nJennifer Holt, Associate Professor, University of California, Santa Barbara
    \nJessica Fjeld, Harvard Law School Cyberlaw Clinic at the Berkman Klein Center
    \nJun Liu, Associate Professor, Department of Communication, University of Copenhagen
    \nLisa Parks, Professor, MIT
    \nMarianne Franklin, Professor of Global Media and Politics
    \nMarietje Schaake, Stanford Cyber Policy Center and Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence
    \nMichael Karanicolas, Wikimedia Fellow, Information Society Project, Yale Law School
    \nMolly Land, UConn Human Rights Institute
    \nRobin Mejia, Department of Statistics & Data Science, Carnegie Mellon University
    \nSebastian Schwemer, Associate Professor, Centre for Information and Innovation Law (CIIR), University of Copenhagen
    \nWafa Ben-Hassine, Human Rights Lawyer
    \nYong Liu, Hebei Academy of Social Sciences<\/em>