UN Secretary-General António Guterres expressed concern on Monday about the tone and content of some statements on social media, especially with the scaling back of monitoring efforts by U.S. platforms.

“Recent rollbacks on social media fact-checking and content moderation are reopening the floodgates to more hate, more threats, and more violence,” Mr Guterres stated at the opening of the UN Human Rights Council session in Geneva.

He highlighted that in January, Facebook’s parent company, Meta, had abolished fact-checking in the U.S., where it had previously been used to expose misinformation.

While social media could be a platform for idea exchange and respectful debate, Mr Guterres warned that without moderation, it risked becoming an arena for heated conflicts and blatant ignorance.

“Verbal violence online can easily spill into physical violence in real life,” he cautioned, adding that these rollbacks would ultimately lead to less free speech as people became more fearful to engage on these platforms.

Mr Guterres also stressed that human rights, “the oxygen of humanity,” are being “suffocated” in many regions due to wars, conflicts, climate change, and authoritarian leaders fearing empowered populations.

He condemned warmongers who disregard international law and humanitarian principles but did not name specific countries.

(dpa/NAN)