Google’s civil rights audit suggests a better fight against hate speech and misinformation
Google released an audit on Friday of how its practices and services affected civil rights and recommended the tech giant take steps to combat misinformation and hate speech following pressure from lawyers.
The company’s disclosure comes after the Washington Post reported earlier Friday that Google asked an outside law firm to conduct a civil rights review. Law firm WilmerHale was tasked with the evaluation.
The review, published on Friday, recommended that Google, particularly YouTube, review its hate speech and harassment policies to address issues such as the intentional misrepresentation or naming of individuals and to “accommodate changing norms around protected groups”.
The review also found that to combat election-related misinformation, the company should ensure that fluent employees are more involved in enforcement efforts, rather than relying on translations.
Google should also consider developing additional metrics to track the speed and effectiveness with which it removes ads containing election-related misinformation, including tougher penalties and permanent bans for repeat violations, the review added.
“We are committed to continuous improvement, which includes efforts to strengthen civil and human rights. To help guide us, we conducted and published a voluntary civil rights audit of our policies, practices and products,” Google’s director of civil rights, Chanelle Hardy, said in an emailed statement Friday.
In recent years, human rights organizations such as Amnesty International have accused large tech companies such as Google of not prioritizing human rights issues.
“A business model based on corporate surveillance inherently conflicts with the right to privacy and threatens many other rights, including freedom of opinion and speech, freedom of thought, and the right to equality and non-discrimination,” Amnesty International had said in a 2019 report on Google and Facebook.
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