The legal conundrum facing ISPs in social media policing against extremism

The purpose of this discussion is to consider whether ISPs have a legal duty to police social media against extremism and if affirmative, the scope of the legal duty. The role of the ISP in social media policing must be seen against the background of a proliferation in extremism which in itself is a controversial topic as it may impact onsensitive topics relating to politics, religion and foreign policy to name but a few. The relevance of ISP policing was highlighted after the 2013 revelations by Snowden, a former US NSA contractor. The NSA allegedly obtained direct access through a program referred to as PRISM to servers of Internet US companies such as Google, Apple and Facebook to collect information which apparently allowed access to the content of information and not merely metadata. Against this background, the Snowden disclosures served as a catalyst for a long-overdue debate pertaining to state surveillance and the role of the ISP in assisting law enforcement and intelligence agencies with surveillance and/or conducting surveillance out of its' own accord. Early 2014 saw the European Court of Justice declaring the Data Retention Directive 2006/24/EC invalid. The Directive provided for ISPs in EU countries to collect metadata of all Internet users for a specified period of time. The Court recognized that although the retention of metadata for investigative purposes was compatible with the European framework, it was disproportionate and contrary to the protection of fundamental human rights. In this regard it should be noted that the Australian government is considering implementing compulsory blanket data retention laws. The legal position of how far ISP policing should go is also ambiguous following a 2014 UK Intelligence and Security Committee report. The reportcriticized ISPs and in this instance, Facebook, for failing to report to intelligence agencies a social media communication by one of the Islamic extremists who was involved in the 2013 murder of UK soldier, Rigby. The report suggests that ISPs and in this instance, social media providers, should identify potential perpetrators and report it to law enforcement and security agencies. Islamic extremism culminating in terrorist attacks has become a serious threat to the safety and security in several countries. Extremism is a globalized concern as has been illustrated by the killing of a Canadian soldier as well as the hostage taking of citizens in Sydney in 2014. Early 2015 saw the killing in Paris of 17 people by Islamic extremists. The question pertaining to the legal duty of ISPs in policing social media communications in order to identify extremism is an interesting, though problematic and controversial issue and applies to ISPs worldwide.It may be that the 2015 Paris events and prior incidents will constitute another 9/11 moment which will change ISP policing of social media against extremism and make the tightrope ISPs tread in ensuring a balance between human rights protection and security even more tenuous.