Why the sale of guns on Facebook in Iraq is so 'rife'
Facebook users in Iraq are exploiting the platform's lack of Arabic and Kurdish-language moderation policies in order to purchase guns online, according to a report.
The study by the Institute of Strategic Dialogue (ISD) has found that the sale of weapons in Iraq is "rife" in Facebook comment sections.
Social media giants have long been accused of failing to effectively moderate harmful and dangerous content, particularly in regions such as the Middle East.
Meta — the parent company of Facebook — has fewer resources to tackle content in various languages and dialects than in English.
The lack of moderation in Arabic and Kurdish has created an open gun market on Facebook in Iraq, said Moustafa Ayad, the ISD Executive Director for Africa, Middle East & Asia.
"It was relatively easy to find weapons for sale on comments sections of very large Facebook pages, pages with over 2 million followers," Ayad told Euronews.
According to his research, some of the users don't even bother hiding their intentions. One example, he cites, is a Facebook user whose name is 'I sell guns' in Kurdish.
There are several reasons why this network of gun sales pages in Iraq is particularly concerning. First, Arabic is one of the fastest growing languages on Facebook and other platforms owned by Meta such as WhatsApp.
The lack of moderation online and the platform's popularity has real-life consequences on the ground.
In June, a disgruntled student in Kurdistan killed the partner of a university lecturer and then assassinated the head of the law department of another institution. The student allegedly bought the firearm on Facebook.
Iraq had a higher rate of violent gun deaths per capita than the United States and the highest in the Middle East and
Read more on euronews.com
