The announcement also included some details about the board’s dedicated staff, which will be responsible for sorting and organizing the various cases. The bylaws also specify 18 different languages in which the ultimate decisions will be made available, a further gesture toward Facebook’s international scope. In theory, this could allow the board to bring more cultural awareness to nuanced local conflicts. According to the bylaws, each case will be decided by a panel consisting of four randomly selected board members and one from the region that’s primarily affected. There are also provisions to ensure local representation, an issue Facebook has struggled with when adjudicating ethnic conflicts in countries like Myanmar and Sri Lanka. However, the board has committed to publishing every decision, and Facebook is committed to responding publicly.Īs the bylaws envision it, some decisions may result in new enforcement systems from Facebook, including new automated systems if particular categories of content are impacted by a decision.

Facebook’s proposed oversight timeline.Ĭrucially, Facebook may not be able to adopt every recommendation made by the board, particularly where the board’s decisions intersect with local laws or Facebook user privacy principles. The option to appeal to the board will be offered to all users as an extension of the existing Facebook moderation appeal process. Once a claim is submitted for appeal (either by the user or by Facebook itself), the company envisions a complete adjudication of the process within 90 days, including publication of the board’s decision and a policy recommendation from Facebook. While the board will determine the pace of its own meetings, Facebook also laid out a specific timeline for handling claims. The charter for that corporation was released in September, and the bylaws proposed today give a newly detailed look at how it will interact with the Facebook platform.

Conceived as an independent body to handle Facebook’s most difficult moderation decisions, the board will exist as its own corporate entity, funded by an irrevocable $130 million donation from Facebook. Once that board is in place, it will have the opportunity to make changes to the draft bylaws proposed by Facebook.įirst announced in 2018, Facebook’s Oversight Board has been slow to develop, in part because of the politically delicate nature of the process. Harris said the company had narrowed down members to “a few dozen” candidates, but it has not made any formal offers. “this isn’t just a board that looks like Silicon Valley.”

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