New Zealand’s privacy commissioner slammed Facebook after it hosted a livestream of the Christchurch attacks, calling the social media giant “morally bankrupt pathological liars.”
“Facebook cannot be trusted,” John Edwards wrote in a series of since-deleted tweets over the weekend, according to the Guardian.
“They are morally bankrupt pathological liars who enable genocide (Myanmar), facilitate foreign undermining of democratic institutions.
“[They] allow the live streaming of suicides, rapes, and murders, continue to host and publish the mosque attack video, allow advertisers to target ‘Jew haters’ and other hateful market segments, and refuse to accept any responsibility for any content or harm.
“They #dontgiveazuck,” he wrote, in a play on words of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg’s name.
He later deleted the tweets, explaining they had fueled “toxic and misinformed traffic.”
I have deleted the tweets promoting my discussion about Mark Zuckerberg’s interview because of the volume of toxic and misinformed traffic they prompted. Here is the actual conversation with @SusieFergusonNZ on @NZMorningReport https://t.co/YcCmnFvT7r
— John Edwards (@JCE_PC) April 8, 2019
In an interview with ABC News last week, Zuckerberg said Facebook would not delay livestream feeds in an effort to reduce the spread of videos like the Christchurch massacre.
“It would also fundamentally break what livestreaming is for people. Most people are livestreaming, you know, a birthday party or hanging out with friends when they can’t be together,” Zuckerberg said. “So if you had a delay that would break that.”
Edwards later told Radio New Zealand that Facebook “is capable of causing great harm” and the company has refused to tell his office how many murders, suicides and sexual assaults have been broadcast on the platform.
