The Artificial Intelligence (AI) tracker created by The Centre for the first International Day for Countering Hate Speech, has noted an increase in hateful tweets over the past three months.
The Centre is a group of experts who research and endorse for progressive and practical policy ideas, with the goal of raising knowledge regarding the importance of self-regulating and rebutting hate speech, and shared with the Content Forum, an independent industry self-regulatory body under the Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) and they collect the data gathered by the AI.
“In March, #TrackerBenci recorded 2,740 tweets identified as hateful and this figure rose to 3,088 in April and went down slightly to 3,004 in May. 34% of the terms and/or phrases recorded by the tracker system have been identified as potentially hateful.”
GO Communications on behalf of the Content Forum.
The Centre’s Chief Executive Officer, Khairil Izamin Ahmad, said that a resource centre was established as part of the campaign to combat hate speech, where the public may learn about local online hate speech trends. He also added that to combat hate speech effectively, people must first be aware of it.
On the centre’s website, content makers may use the Benci Calculator to see if a term contains hate speech and, if so, what form of hate speech it is.
Hate speech is defined as “any portrayal of words, speech or pictures that aims to defame, denigrate or otherwise devalue a person or group on the basis of race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, gender, sexual orientation or disability” according to a statement from the Content Forum.
As a step to encourage tolerance among the escalating instances of hate speech online, the United Nations General Assembly declared June 18 as the inaugural International Day for Countering Hate Speech.
