Malaysia announced on Friday that it will take legal action against Meta, the parent company of Facebook, for not removing “undesirable” posts. The government, led by Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob, pledged to crack down on posts that contain content related to race and religion. This move comes as Malaysia has been grappling with increased racial tensions following recent political turmoil. Facebook has faced backlash in recent weeks for failing to adequately address problematic content, including content related to race, extremism, defamation, imitation, online gambling, and deceptive advertising. The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission criticized Meta for its lack of response to multiple requests, stating that legal action is necessary to promote cybersecurity and protect consumers. Ethnicity and religion are sensitive issues in Malaysia, with the majority Muslim Malay population accompanied by minority Chinese and Indian communities. Criticizing revered monarchies is also a sensitive topic, and negative comments against these monarchies can be legally punishable. The crackdown on Facebook comes just weeks before the elections in six states, which is expected to be a highly contested campaign among Ismail’s multi-ethnic Perikatan Nasional coalition and the opposition Pakatan Harapan, which is largely supported by the Malay Muslim majority. Facebook is the largest social media platform in Malaysia, with approximately 60% of the country’s population of 33 million registered accounts. Meta, YouTube by Google, and TikTok, are global social media giants that are often subject to content regulation regulations on their platforms. Governments in some Southeast Asian countries have frequently called for the removal of content. In 2019, Facebook deleted hundreds of accounts, pages, and local groups linked to fake news organizations in Indonesia. Vietnam threatened to shut down Facebook in 2020 if it did not comply with the government’s demand to censor additional local political content, stating that the social media platform had deleted more than 3,200 posts and videos that contained misinformation and violated the country’s laws in the first quarter of that year. Meta Data: {“keywords”:[“Facebook”, “Meta”, “Malaysia”]}
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