On Thursday, Facebook posted an ad on their website for a job opening within the company that is looking for someone to join their security team in order to fight terror. Facebook is looking for a “counterterrorism research analyst” to help them better understand and stop terrorists who use their platform to grow, advance, and spread their radical ideas.
“Facebook’s Information Security organization seeks an experienced counterterrorism analyst to join our Washington, DC-based team. In this role, the candidate will be responsible for helping drive our efforts around identifying the latest tools, tactics, and infrastructure used by terrorist actors as they affect Facebook and its ecosystems to better defend against and disrupt these threats,” the job description says.
Facebook creator Mark Zuckerberg with President Obama.
The responsibilities include “help drive cross-functional and cross-industry initiatives to better understand terrorists and contemporary militant groups and their activity online” and “determine the credibility, value, significance, and relevance of information from various data sources.”
“Background in counterterrorism or counterintelligence” is among the minimum qualifications required.
Facebook has stated in the past that it believes it has an obligation to keep its social network safe. Following the San Bernardino terrorist attack, police took to Facebook to investigate the suspect’s profile but Facebook had already removed the terrorist’s page. Experts have said that networks like Facebook should not delete such information so quickly, but rather let investigators have a chance to study and gather evidence from them.
Facebook and Twitter backed Apple in refusing to help the Government access the terrorists’ digital information.
Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn told the Wall Street Journal in an interview that tech companies “have a social responsibility to not just see themselves as a place where people can freely express themselves and debate issues.”
Facebook’s initiative to hire a counterterrorism analyst has been seen across many social media platforms in recent months. Twitter recently developed a “trust and safety” council to police their users and the content they post. Through the program Twitter has shut down tens of thousands of accounts that admit to being members of the Islamic State.
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