Theresa May has vowed to tighten regulation against tech firms in the wake of the terrorist attack at London Bridge, provoking widespread criticism.
In a speech outside Downing Street on Sunday, May said internet companies provided a “safe space” for terrorist activity and called for further policing of the internet.
“We cannot allow this ideology the safe space it needs to breed’, May said, adding that this “is precisely what the internet, and the big companies… provide.”
The Prime Minster’s comments have provoked criticism from campaigners and defence specialists, with many arguing that intensifying censorship of the internet will not tackle the root of the problem.
Simon Milner, Facebook’s director of policy, confirmed that it actively pursued a strategy to make the social network site a “hostile” environment for terrorist thought, saying:
“Using a combination of technology and human review, we work aggressively to remove terrorist content from our platform as soon as we become aware of it — and if we become aware of an emergency involving imminent harm to someone’s safety, we notify law enforcement.”
Facebook activated its Safety Check tool in the wake of the attack on London Bridge, which saw a van plough into pedestrians on the bridge late on Saturday evening.
Google also defended the tech sector’s approach to extremism, saying it had already spent hundreds of millions of pounds to fight abuse on its platforms and was already working on an “international forum to accelerate and strengthen our existing work in this area”.
The firm said it fully supported “the government’s commitment to ensuring terrorists do not have a voice online”.