A landmark lawsuit by Rohingya refugees against Facebook is a 'wake-up call' for social media firms and a test case for courts, legal experts said.
The $150bn class-action argues that Facebook’s failure to police content and its platform’s design contributed to violence against the RohingyaBangkok/Los Angeles —
“Facebook profited from our suffering. The survivors have no option other than a lawsuit against Facebook. It will be an injustice if Rohingya survivors are not compensated for their losses,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.In an earlier statement in response to the lawsuit, a Meta spokesperson said the company was “appalled by the crimes committed against the Rohingya people in Myanmar.”
“The timing of these announcements shows the lawsuit is a wake-up call. The lawsuit itself is quite a bold move, but the Rohingya clearly felt there were sufficient grounds,” she said. A Reuters investigation that year, cited in the US complaint, found more than 1,000 examples of posts, comments and images attacking the Rohingya and other Muslims on Facebook.
While the technology industry and others have long held that Section 230 is a crucial protection, the statute has become increasingly controversial as the power of internet companies has grown.
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