‘Facebook has clear, detailed policies against hate speech’

Ajit Mohan, Vice-President and Managing Director, Facebook India, on Friday said the company has clear and very detailed policies against hate speech, which prohibit attacks on people on the basis of protected characteristics, including religion, ethnicity, caste and national origin.

"Facebook is and always has been an open, transparent and non-partisan platform where people can express themselves freely, " Mohan said in a post.

This comes after a Wall Street Journal report alleged that Facebook did not pull down content by a BJP leader despite it being flagged as hate speech at the behest of a Facebook India senior executive for fear of drawing the ire of the Indian Government.

"Over the last few days, we have been accused of bias in the way we enforce our policies. We take allegations of bias incredibly seriously, and want to make it clear that we denounce hate and bigotry in any form," Mohan said.

"The decisions around content escalations are not made unilaterally by just one person," Mohan added.

He added that "we know this work is never over, which is why we will continue to invest in our efforts to combat hate speech on our services. We welcome the opportunity to engage with all parties - political or otherwise - who want to understand our content policies and enforcement more."