Energy firms join Facebook ad boycott

Several energy retailers have temporarily pulled their advertisements from Facebook as part of a wider international boycott.

Centrica, Eon, EDF and Pure Planet have all joined the Stop Hate for Profit campaign which calls on advertisers to pull out of the social media platform for one month, amid claims Facebook allows the promotion of hate speech, discrimination and misinformation.

The campaign, which originated in the United States, hopes the boycott will put a dent in Facebook’s revenues and encourage it to implement a series of actions including submitting to regular independent third-party audits into identity-based hate and misinformation.

In addition, it demands Facebook find and remove public and private groups focused on “white supremacy, militia, antisemitism, violent conspiracies, Holocaust denialism, vaccine misinformation, and climate denialism”.

Pure Planet co-founder Steven Day said not enough is being done to stop hateful material appearing on Facebook’s sites.

Day added: “Social media platforms play an important role in our lives but Facebook must live up to its responsibilities to protect users and society as a whole and stop publishing racist, false, harmful and offensive materials. They must enforce these policies fairly and across the board.

“We don’t have the advertising budgets of Unilever or Coca-Cola, but we do have a voice. The bulk of Facebook’s revenue from advertising comes from their ‘long tail’ of smaller advertisers. We think businesses and advertisers of all sizes can send an important message to Facebook and we encourage other modest-spending advertisers to use their voices too.

“Improved controls to protect people are long overdue on Facebook’s properties and we back the  Stop Hate For Profit campaign in making this call. We’ll continue to monitor Facebook’s position and review our stance as appropriate.”

A spokesperson for Centrica confirmed the company had stopped all Facebook advertising in July and said: “There is no room for discrimination and hate speech on any channel and we will be engaging with Facebook to try and drive positive change.

“We recognise that we also have more to do to build a diverse and inclusive workplace and this also includes ensuring we only support organisations that uphold and share these values.”

A statement from Eon said the company acts in line with essential values such as respect, diversity and tolerance.

It added: “We expressly and resolutely oppose racism, hate speech and discrimination. We also expect this clear attitude from our partners. In this context, we consider it our responsibility to review our commitment and our role on Facebook and Instagram.

“The Eon Group will therefore discontinue all ads, posts and activities on Facebook and Instagram until further notice. We hereby take a stand against hate speech, discrimination and intolerance.”

Facebook has recently outlined processes it has in place in order to tackle hate speech, including following up with individuals who report incidents to outline the actions it has taken, as well as committing to providing more information about hate speech in reports.

Writing in a blog earlier this month former deputy prime minister Nick Clegg, VP of global affairs and communications at Facebook, said the website did not profit from hate.

He added: “When we find hateful posts on Facebook and Instagram, we take a zero tolerance approach and remove them. When content falls short of being classified as hate speech — or of our other policies aimed at preventing harm or voter suppression — we err on the side of free expression because, ultimately, the best way to counter hurtful, divisive, offensive speech, is more speech. Exposing it to sunlight is better than hiding it in the shadows.

“Unfortunately, zero tolerance doesn’t mean zero incidences. With so much content posted every day, rooting out the hate is like looking for a needle in a haystack. We invest billions of dollars each year in people and technology to keep our platform safe. We have tripled — to more than 35,000 — the people working on safety and security. We’re a pioneer in artificial intelligence technology to remove hateful content at scale.”

Clegg added that a recent European Commission report found that Facebook assessed 95.7 per cent of hate speech reports in less than 24 hours. Furthermore, the site took action against 9.6 million pieces of content in the first quarter of 2020 — up from 5.7 million in the previous quarter.