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Western governments have accused major internet companies of not
doing enough to stop groups such as Islamic State promoting
violence on social media or taking more responsibility for the
impact of material posted on their sites.
After this week's attacks in the northern English city of
Manchester, the Group of Seven - Britain, Canada, France,
Germany, Italy, Japan and the United States - toughened a final
statement to fight terrorism, honing in on the role of companies
like Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon, sometimes referred to
generally in Europe using the acronym Gafa.
"We will combat the misuse of the Internet by terrorists. While
being one of the most important technological achievements in
the last decades, the Internet has also proven to be a powerful
tool for terrorist purposes," said the joint statement signed by
the leaders meeting in Sicily.
"The G7 calls for Communication Service Providers and social
media companies to substantially increase their efforts to
address terrorist content," it said.
British Prime Minister Theresa May and French President Emmanuel
Macron, who during his election campaign had called for tougher
action on internet firms, insisted on strengthening language on
the issue, diplomats said.
"In particular, I want to see them report this vile content to
the authorities and block the users who spread it," May told
reporters.
The statement stopped short of calling for measures to penalize
firms that failed to meet the necessary requirements, however.
"The Gafas and the industry need to act quickly to detect and
destroy content that calls for terrorism, hatred and
radicalization," a senior French diplomat said.
"We are still in the framework of existing laws, but there has
never been as much pressure from the G7 countries on these
companies to ensure that this content is divulged and destroyed.
We're increasing that pressure," he said.
(Reporting by Steve Scherer, John Irish and Elizabeth Piper;
Editing by Crispian Balmer and Sonya Hepinstall)
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