Facebook Watch section filled with pornographic content, some even live-streamed: Report

Highlights
  • Facebook pages with camouflaged names are streaming pornographic content.
  • These pages have not faced any action up till now.
  • Videos are shared with captions saying “Top Movies Netflix 2023” and even using Mark Zuckerberg as the hashtag. 

Facebook’s live video section has been filled with pornographic content, and it’s happening here in India. There are several Facebook pages that are streaming porn live and have been doing it for quite some time without any takedowns, according to a report by Entrackr

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Facebook live streaming porn videos

Facebook has been going big on video content and it also has a dedicated ‘Watch’ section on the platform. Here, you can find videos recommended for you, live streaming, Reels, music, gaming, and from people and pages you follow. If you open the live tab on Facebook Watch, you’ll see a centralised feed with live videos from different pages and creators. This is where certain Facebook pages are live streaming pornographic content with some having over 3,000 real-time viewers, the report added. 

The source pages are also slyly camouflaging their identity by using random people’s names, titles such as “funny videos” or “viral videos”. Some of these pages have also been listed as gaming creators, an area Facebook has been trying to push for a while. To get more traction and views, these pages are also using hashtags like #CristianoRonaldo. We couldn’t verify this though since we didn’t come across any such videos. But the report did mention other users also coming across pornographic content on Facebook.  

Not just the live video section but the ‘For You’ section of Facebook Watch which is supposed to be where you see recommended content, is also filled with explicit content. A quick browse through this section will show what look like pornographic content sans the nudity. These videos are shared with captions saying “Top Movies Netflix 2023” and even using Mark Zuckerberg as the hashtag. 

Facebook has been dealing with violent content on its platform for years now. It has over time hired staff and resources, and also relied on its AI algorithm to detect such videos and remove them from the platform. But it looks like it now has to deal with pornographic content which by the looks of it need serious attention.

Facebook like other social platforms rely on user feedback such as reporting certain videos which then undergo investigation and actions are taken accordingly. With the current state of pornographic videos on Facebook that are possibly bypassing the platform’s built-in detectors, it would mean more stringent tools to automatically detect such content and remove them.