Paris vs. Beirut: Why didn't Facebook offer Safety Check for both attacks?
Some have complained that Facebook's 'safety check' feature wasn't offered in Lebanon after bombings there. Is there a Western standard and a Middle Eastern standard?
Some have complained that Facebook's 'safety check' feature wasn't offered in Lebanon after bombings there. Is there a Western standard and a Middle Eastern standard?
As terrorist attacks rocked Paris Friday night in six different venues and over the course of three hours, a safety feature released by Facebook offered some remedial relief: anyone with friends in Paris was notified of their status as soon as it was updated by a green verification checkmark.
Facebook鈥檚 Safety Check was first introduced last year, a product spawned by the Disaster Message Board used when聽the devastating tsunami struck Japan in 2011.
鈥淯nfortunately, these kinds of disasters happen all too frequently. Each time, we see people, relief organizations and first responders turn to Facebook in the aftermath of a major natural disaster,鈥� the team wrote last October. 鈥淭hese events have taught us a lot about how people use Facebook during disasters and we were personally inspired to continue work on the Disaster Message Board to incorporate what we鈥檝e learned.鈥�
Safety Check is offered globally for Android, iOS, feature phones and desktop users 鈥� the feature received high praise from media and citizens to reach loved ones in Paris.
But the absence of Safety Check in Lebanon Thursday prompted some to express outrage in social media: 聽Why hadn鈥檛 Safety Check been offered during a double suicide bombing in Beirut聽that killed 37 people and wounded 200 more 鈥� just one day before the Paris attack.
鈥淧aris is a tragedy. Beirut is a tragedy. And the fact that Beirut 鈥榤atters鈥� less than Paris is a tragedy,鈥� one Twitter user wrote.
鈥淭his is what corporate western bias looks like,鈥� wrote another Twitter user.
The two incidents have obvious differences: the Parisian attackers went after 鈥榮oft targets鈥� like concert venues and restaurants and the attacks were brutal, unpredictable and exceptionally random. Beirut鈥檚 bombings were more ostensibly religious targets: the bombers went after a district long dominated by Hezbollah, and directly attacked a Shiite mosque and a meeting. A suicide bomber also terrorized a Shiite funeral in Baghdad yesterday killing another 19.
France and Lebanon, however, share a gruesome history of being an ISIS target. Friday鈥檚 attacks in Paris were just nine months after the brutal attack on Charlie Hebdo鈥檚 headquarters. And Beirut has seen a series of suicide bombings 鈥� with 14 bombings between July 2013 and June 2014 that left nearly 100 dead.
The Paris attacks were the first time Facebook turned on its Safety Check for a terrorist attack. The five previous deployments - all this year - were after earthquakes (in聽Afghanistan, Chile and Nepal)聽and major storms (in the South Pacific and the Philippines).聽
Still, many are raising the question over what standards Facebook is using to decide when it enables its Safety Check.
The International Business Times reports that Facebook issued this statement Saturday afternoon: