“I was one of those that criticized [Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg] when he activated the safety check in Paris despite the fact that Boko Haram has been bombing us in north eastern Nigeria for years, killing thousands of people, yet Facebook didn’t deem it fit to activate the safety check”, said Maulud Usman, a resident of Yola.
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The safety check means that Facebook users who are in affected areas can quickly post on their Facebook walls that they are safe and alive.
While people welcomed Facebook’s decision on Wednesday, others said it didn’t go far enough.
Facebook came under fire for a perceived Western bias when it activated Safety Check after the Paris attacks, with critics noting that terrorist attacks in the Middle East, Africa, and Asia hadn’t previously warranted its deployment.
Accusations of a double standard prompted online responses from Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and Alex Schultz, the company’s vice president of growth.
After the Paris terrorist attacks last week, a few of you may have noticed among the expressions of grief, shock and support for France on your Facebook and Twitter feeds a certain amount of criticism over what one might call ethnocentric empathy. “Until yesterday, our policy was only to activate Safety Check for natural disasters”.
An early iteration of the Safety Check was first used during the tsunami and nuclear disaster in Tokyo in 2011. It was also active after the recent earthquakes in Afghanistan, Chile and Nepal.
We’ve activated Safety Check again after the bombing in Nigeria this evening. Zuckerberg said at the weekend the feature would be used more widely in the future. “We just changed this and now plan to activate Safety Check for more human disasters going forward as well”.
“There has to be a first time for trying something new, even in complex and sensitive times, and for us that was Paris”, Mr. Schultz wrote in a post.
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Meanwhile, there was more violence in Nigeria on Wednesday as two large explosions triggered by suicide bombers killed 12 people and wounded 66 at a mobile phone market in the northern city of Kano.
