It goes without saying that when you put your thoughts out into the world, you deserve to feel safe and when this safety is attacked, your mental health may get affected. Facebook, a platform for promoting your thoughts and ideas, has moved from being a purely interactive social media platform to a place where trolls and trollers rule the roost. To protect its more than 2 billion regular user base, Facebook has passed new tools and tweaked its settings to act against the bullies.

Delete, moderate and remove negative comments 

“Do not feed the trolls,” is what people have always said. How often does one listen to the wise sayings of the people with experience? Never, right? If a bear pokes you, you cannot help but poke back and this is how negativism breeds on a constant basis on Facebook. To counter this growing trend of hatred, Facebook is going to give its users more control over the comments.

Sharing more details about last week’s security issue for developers using Facebook Login: https://t.co/gtKc3Jm7Z2

— Facebook (@facebook) October 2, 2018

Now, not only can you hide multiple comments, you can also delete them with the click of a button. The new feature is going to be rolled out on desktops, Android and iOS versions. Furthermore, if you think a family member or friend is being bullied, harassed or abused, you can report the said post on behalf of the friend or family member. Once reported, the Community Operations team will take a look at the post and decide the required action on the basis of Facebook’s rules and regulations.

To simplify matters, if you think the decision taken by the Committee is not what you thought it would be (both for the person who raised the complaint and the person against whom the complaint has been made,) you can make an appeal and the Committee will decide accordingly.

Protection of not just individual users, but celebrities as well

So far, Facebook has allowed people to talk, criticize and discuss about celebrities and the things they have said and done, without any regard to the person’s well being. Now, Facebook is working on protecting these celebrities by making sure no celebrity on the platform is personally and negatively attacked.

Previously, Facebook had introduced a tool that protected celebrities up to a certain age. However, to improve the safety standards, the social media platform is now expanding its policies to protect celebrities without age as a barrier. With Facebook’s new tools, anyone experiencing things they do not want to on Facebook can now report, block the user and ignore the messages without letting the harasser know.

Taking safety one step forward, Facebook is going to start a new partnership with the National Parent Teachers Association in the United States and will organise over 200 community events to address the challenges faced by parents in all the states. Further, Facebook is also going to offer peer to peer anti bullying and safety programs to schools in the United Kingdom. By organising and supporting safety programs in India, Facebook is spreading the message of improving the standards of online safety in all the countries where this social media platform is used on a regular basis.

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