Can Facebook use AI to fight online abuse?

(FILES) This file photo taken on November 20, 2017 shows logos of US online social media and social networking service Facebook. Facebook on February 27, 2018 announced a $3 million pilot project aimed at helping US newspapers boost paid digital subscriptions. The move was the latest by the huge social network to respond to concerns that it and other online platforms have hurt news organizations by dominating internet advertising. / AFP PHOTO / LOIC VENANCE

Facebook has released statistics on abusive behaviour on its social media network, deleting more than 22 million posts for violating its rules against pornography and hate speech – and deleting or adding warnings about violence to another 3.5 million posts. 

Many of those were detected by automated systems monitoring users’ activity, in line with CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s statement to Congress that his company would use artificial intelligence to identify social media posts that might violate the company’s policies. As an academic researching AI and adversarial machine learning, I can say he was right to acknowledge the significant challenges: “Determining if something is hate speech is very linguistically nuanced.“