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The
types of communication include postings related to "explosives,
destructive devices, and weapons of mass destruction," according
to the text. An official familiar with the bill said it was sent
to the Senate floor for a vote.
The official said its main purpose was to give social media
companies additional legal protection if they reported to the
authorities on traffic circulated by their users, rather than
coerce them to spy on users.
It was unclear when the Senate might vote on the bill.
A congressional official said it was also unclear whether the
House of Representatives would pursue similar legislation, which
would be necessary for the proposed requirement to become law.
Social media groups have been widely used by militant groups
such as Islamic State and Yemen-based Al Qaeda in the Arabian
Peninsula to recruit members and circulate bomb-making
instructions.
At a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday, Dianne
Feinstein, the senior Democrat on the Senate Intelligence
Committee and sponsor of the legislation, said social media
companies should be working with the government to prevent the
use of their systems by violent militants.
"Twitter, FB and YouTube all, as I understand it, remove content
on their sites that come to their attention if it violates their
terms of service, including terrorism," Feinstein said.
But, she said, "the companies do not proactively monitor their
sites to identify such content nor do they inform the FBI when
they identify or remove their content. I believe they should."
The social media legislation, part of a larger intelligence
authorization bill, would not require social media companies to
monitor specific users or content posted by individuals. Nor
would it penalize companies that failed to comply.
"We share the government's goal of keeping terrorist content off
our site," Facebook's Head of Policy Management Monika Bickert
said in a statement.
"Our policies on this are crystal clear: we do not permit
terrorist groups to use Facebook, and people are not allowed to
promote or support these groups on Facebook. We remove this
terrorist content as soon as we become aware of it.”
A representative of Twitter said that her company had not taken
a position on the legislation. Google did not immediately
respond to requests for comment.
(Reporting by Mark Hosenball; additional reporting by Lindsay
Dunsmuir; Editing by Howard Goller, Eric Walsh and Ken Wills)
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