Facebook: Our AI tools failed to catch New Zealand attack video

Facebook acknowledged that the gruesome video of the New Zealand mosque shootings revealed gaps in its handling of live broadcasts by users, but pushed back against the idea of setting up a time delay.

Guy Rosen, Facebook’s vice president for integrity, said in a post late Wednesday that the company’s artificial intelligence tools had failed to catch the video of the terrorist attack in Christchurch last week that was aired live on the social media platform by the shooter. The 17-minute video shows men, women and children being gunned down in a mosque.

Mr. Rosen also said the video wasn’t prioritized for an expedited review when it was flagged by a user. That is because the user flagged the video after it ended, not during the live broadcast. In those cases, Facebook accelerates its reviews only if there is a report of a suicide attempt.