Islamabad, An investigative report has found that Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, approved advertisements containing calls for violence against Muslims during the recent general election in India, raising serious concerns about the enforcement of its hate speech policies.
According to Kashmir Media Service, the investigation led by Eko and India Civil Watch International tested Meta’s ad approval process by submitting 22 advertisements that included inflammatory and hateful content against Muslims. Despite Meta’s stated community standards that prohibit such content, the majority of these ads were approved quickly, some within 24 hours and others after slight modifications. Only five submissions were rejected.
The content of the approved ads included explicit calls to violence such as “let’s burn this vermin” and “these invaders must be burned”, alongside other inflammatory statements. This has sparked significant outcry and intensified scrutiny over Meta’s capability to manage hate speech and misinformation on its platforms, especially in regions like India where communal tensions are heightened during election periods.
The revelation adds to ongoing criticism of Meta’s handling of Islamophobic content and has prompted demands for more robust mechanisms to prevent the spread of such content on social media.