1/3/24, 12:49 AM Oversight Board | Independent judgement. Transparency. Legitimacy. To read this decision in Khmer, click here. ដើម្បីអានសេចក្ដីសម្រេចនេះជាភាសាខ្មែ រ សូ មចុច នៅទីនេះ។ Case summary The Oversight Board has overturned Meta's decision to leave up a video on Facebook in which Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen threatens his political opponents with violence. Given the severity of the violation, Hun Sen's history of committing human rights violations and intimidating political opponents, as well as his strategic use of social media to amplify such threats, the Board calls on Meta to immediately suspend Hun Sen's Facebook Page and Instagram account for six months. About the case On 9 January 2023, a live video was streamed from the official Facebook Page of Cambodia's Prime Minister, Hun Sen. The video shows a one hour 41-minute speech delivered by Hun Sen in Khmer – Cambodia's official language. In the speech, he responds to allegations that his ruling Cambodia People's Party (CPP) stole votes during the country's local elections in 2022. He calls on his political opponents who made the allegations to choose between the "legal system" and "a bat", and says that they can choose the legal system, or he "will gather CPP people to protest and beat you up". He also mentions "sending gangsters to [your] house" and says that he may "arrest a traitor with sufficient evidence at midnight". Later in the speech, however, he says "we don't incite people and encourage people to use force". After the live broadcast, the video was automatically uploaded onto Hun Sen's Facebook Page, where is has been viewed around 600,000 times. Three users reported the video five times between 9 January and 26 January 2023, for violating Meta's Violence and Incitement Community Standard. This prohibits "threats that could lead to death" (high-severity violence) and "threats that lead to serious injury (mid-severity violence)", including "[s]tatements of intent to commit violence". After the users who reported the content appealed, it was reviewed by two human reviewers who found that it did not violate Meta's policies. At the same time, the content was escalated to policy and subject matter experts within Meta. They determined that it violated the Violence and Incitement Community Standard, but applied a newsworthiness allowance. This permits otherwise violating content where the public interest value outweighs the risk of it causing harm. One of the users who reported the content appealed Meta's decision to the Board. Separately, Meta referred the case to the Board. In its referral, Meta stated that the case involves a challenging balance between its values of "Safety" and "Voice" in determining when to allow speech that violates its Violence and Incitement policy by a political leader to remain on its platforms. Key findings The Board finds that the video in this case included unequivocal statements of intent to commit violence against Hun Sen's political opponents, which clearly violate the Violence and Incitement policy. The use of terms such as "bat" and "sending gangsters to [your] house" or "legal action", including midnight arrests, amounts to incitement of violence and legal intimidation. The Board finds that Meta was wrong to apply a newsworthiness allowance in this case, as the harm caused by allowing the content on the platform outweighs the post's public interest value. Given Hun Sen's reach on social media, allowing this kind of expression on Facebook enables his threats to spread more broadly. It also results in Meta's platforms contributing to these harms by amplifying the threats and resulting intimidation. The Board is also concerned that a political leader's sustained campaign of harassment and intimidation against independent media and the political opposition can become a factor in a newsworthiness assessment that leads to violating content not being removed and the account avoiding penalties. Such behaviour should not be rewarded. Meta should more heavily weigh press freedom when considering newsworthiness so that the allowance is not applied to government speech in situations where that government has made its own content more newsworthy by limiting free press. The Board urges Meta to clarify that its policy on restricting the accounts of public figures is not limited solely to single incidents of violence and i il b l li i hi h i i https://www.oversightboard.com/decision/FB-6OKJPNS3/ d i i h f li i l f h i 2/14