Facebook Safety Search Activated (Again) After Nigeria Bombing
Facebook has activated their Safety Check tool for the second time following a bomb blast this Wednesday, Nov. 18 in Nigeria where at least 31 people died and 72 others were injured. Soon after the news of the blast in Yola broke out, Facebook activated their Safety Check for Yola's residents. This happened a week after first activating it for the Paris attacks.
Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a post that they have activated Facebook's Safety Check feature again after the Nigeria bombing as part of the pledge they have earlier made; the pledge to use their Safety Check feature more often. Zuckerberg adds that a loss of human life anywhere is a tragedy and Facebook is committed to doing their part in helping people who find themselves in these kinds of situations.
Earlier, Zuckerberg has said that yes, there are many other important conflicts in the world (referring to the Paris attacks controversy), Facebook cares about all people equally and will work hard to help suffering people in these kinds of situations as much as they can.
Facebook, after being at the end of heavy criticisms due to their Safety Check feature being used in the Paris attacks but not on the Beirut attack, has set on to change their policy. They are now also working quickly on creating criteria for their new policy to determine when and how the "Safety Check" feature can be most helpful to their users.
The Safety Check feature was announced last year in October based on a location tool built following the 2011 tsunami and nuclear disasters in Japan. The feature was originally made to be used for natural disasters. It was first activated when an earthquake in Nepal happened last April 2015 then turned on again in May for another earthquake and was used again on last October's Hurricane Patricia.
Safety Check allows users located nearby a dangerous situation to check-in by announcing they are safe. It was expanded to cover not only natural disasters but other situations as well after Facebook felt like they can expand and use it far more widely than its original use.