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Facebook Steps Up Fight Against 'Hateful Content' in Ads

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, seen in an October 2019 picture, said the social network will step up efforts to curb hateful content and also add tags to rule-breaking posts that are "newsworthy" | AFP
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, seen in an October 2019 picture, said the social network will step up efforts to curb hateful content and also add tags to rule-breaking posts that are "newsworthy" | AFP
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Facebook Steps Up Fight Against 'Hateful Content' in Ads

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, seen in an October 2019 picture, said the social network will step up efforts to curb hateful content and also add tags to rule-breaking posts that are "newsworthy" | AFP
Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, seen in an October 2019 picture, said the social network will step up efforts to curb hateful content and also add tags to rule-breaking posts that are "newsworthy" | AFP

Facebook said Friday it would ban a "wider category of hateful content" in ads as the embattled social media giant moved to respond to growing protests over its handling of inflammatory posts.

Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook also would add tags to posts that are "newsworthy" but violate platform rules -- following the lead of Twitter, which has used such labels on tweets from President Donald Trump.

The initiative comes with the leading social network facing a growing boycott by advertisers -- with soft drink behemoth Coca-Cola and Anglo-Dutch giant Unilever joining Friday -- as activists seek tougher action on content they deem to promote discrimination, hatred or violence.

The new policy on hateful content in ads will "prohibit claims that people from a specific race, ethnicity, national origin, religious affiliation, caste, sexual orientation, gender identity or immigration status are a threat to the physical safety, health or survival of others," Zuckerberg said.

"We're also expanding our policies to better protect immigrants, migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers" from hateful ads, he continued.

Facebook has underscored its moves to stem racism in the wake of civil unrest triggered by the May 25 killing of African American George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.

"We invest billions of dollars each year to keep our community safe and continuously work with outside experts to review and update our policies," a spokesperson said.

"The investments we have made in (artificial intelligence) mean that we find nearly 90 percent of hate speech" and take action before users report it.

- 'Newsworthy' exception -

Zuckerberg said the "newsworthy" exemption normally occurs "a handful of times a year," when Facebook decides to leave up a message that would ordinarily be removed for rule violations.

Under the new policy, Zuckerberg said, "we will soon start labeling some of the content we leave up because it is deemed newsworthy, so people can know when this is the case."

He said users will be allowed to share the content "but we'll add a prompt to tell people that the content they're sharing may violate our policies."

Twitter in recent weeks has labeled at least one Trump tweet misleading and has flagged others as violating platform rules, accessible only when users click through a warning. The move has angered the president and his allies.

Internet platforms have faced intense pressure from activists following Floyd's death.

A coalition including the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) has been urging companies to stop advertising on Facebook, using the #StopHateForProfit hashtag.

At the same time, Trump and his allies have voiced anger over what they claim is biased against conservatives.

- Brand boycott accelerates -

Zuckerberg made no mention of the ad boycott but said the changes were based on "feedback from the civil rights community and reflect months of work with our civil rights auditors."

Coca-Cola, a major force in global advertising, said it would suspend ads on social media for at least 30 days as it reassesses its policies, though it said the decision was not related to the #StopHateForProfit campaign.

"There is no place for racism in the world and there is no place for racism on social media," James Quincey, chairman and CEO of The Coca-Cola Company, said in a brief statement.

He said social media companies need to provide "greater accountability and transparency."

Unilever, home to brands including Lipton tea and Ben and Jerry's ice cream, said it would stop advertising on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram in the US until the end of 2020 due to the "polarized election period."

American Honda said it would halt ads on Facebook in July, "choosing to stand with people united against hate and racism," adding to a list that includes US telecom giant Verizon and sporting goods makers Patagonia, North Face and REI.

The Facebook move on hate speech in ads "is welcome but (they) account for a small portion of harmful content on the platform," said Graham Brookie, director of the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensics Research Lab, which monitors social media disinformation.

Michelle Amazeen, a Boston University professor of political communication, said details still remain unclear.

"Will Facebook allow independent verification of which content they tag and the subsequent effects on diffusion?" she asked.

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World

China Tells US Ready to Strengthen Cooperation

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during a press conference after the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers Meeting in Beijing Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026. (AP)
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during a press conference after the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers Meeting in Beijing Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026. (AP)
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China Tells US Ready to Strengthen Cooperation

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during a press conference after the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers Meeting in Beijing Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026. (AP)
Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi speaks during a press conference after the Lancang-Mekong Cooperation Foreign Ministers Meeting in Beijing Wednesday, Nov. 4, 2026. (AP)

China's top diplomat Wang Yi told US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on Wednesday Beijing was "willing to strengthen" cooperation with Washington, the Chinese foreign ministry said.

Wang and Rubio spoke by phone ahead of an expected meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the November 18-19 Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) conference in China's Shenzhen.

The two countries reached an agreement to calm trade tensions during last year's APEC summit in South Korea after they had exchanged tariff escalations earlier in 2025.

"(China) is willing to strengthen communication and cooperation with the US," Wang told Rubio during a "constructive" call, the ministry said in a statement.

Wang added that the countries would support each other in hosting the 2026 APEC summit and G20 summit in the United States.

Beijing stands ready to "properly handle differences and sensitive issues" with Washington, Wang said, adding that "stability" in US-China ties had been "hard won".

Next week's APEC summit could also see a trilateral meeting with Trump, Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin, after each country said they were in discussions about such talks.

Trump said Sunday he would likely be meeting Xi and Putin to discuss ending the Iran war.

World

Italy Evacuates Hundreds of Schools Due to Bomb Alert, with Threats in Scotland and Ireland

Policemen stand outside the "Virgilio" middle school after children have been evacuated due to a bomb alert, in Rome on November 11, 2026. (AFP)
Policemen stand outside the "Virgilio" middle school after children have been evacuated due to a bomb alert, in Rome on November 11, 2026. (AFP)
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Italy Evacuates Hundreds of Schools Due to Bomb Alert, with Threats in Scotland and Ireland

Policemen stand outside the "Virgilio" middle school after children have been evacuated due to a bomb alert, in Rome on November 11, 2026. (AFP)
Policemen stand outside the "Virgilio" middle school after children have been evacuated due to a bomb alert, in Rome on November 11, 2026. (AFP)

Italian authorities evacuated hundreds of schools Wednesday after an emailed bomb threat, the latest in a series of disruptions affecting European institutions following recent hoaxes aimed at airlines and broadcasters.

Schools in Ireland, Scotland and Northern Ireland received similar threats, but no evacuations were reported.

The Italian Education Ministry said the email threat was received by over 6,300 schools, but it was not immediately known how many had been evacuated.

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni said there was no indication of any “concrete danger” to schools and that the threats appeared aimed at “generating alarm and concern.” She said investigations were underway and that she had called a meeting of ministers for later Wednesday.

The anonymous email also threatened Meloni, according to copies obtained by Italian media, including the LaPresse news agency. She did not address the personal threat in her statement, and her office had no immediate comment.

The email purported to come from the leader of an otherwise unknown group with an anti-woman name and contained particularly violent threats. It was signed with the same Russian name used in last week’s threats against European broadcasters.

Authorities have not attributed the threats to any group or state, and no evidence has emerged linking the hoaxes to a government.

Threats reported in other countries

Police in Northern Ireland said they were conducting “urgent inquiries” after a threatening email was sent to hundreds of schools. Police in Scotland said they were treating similar messages as hoaxes and were not requiring schools to evacuate.

“Our assessment remains that they do not represent a credible threat,” Police Scotland said.

Police in Ireland also said they were aware of a “generic communication” sent to several educational institutions.

Rome students learn of threat after evacuation

“These are very delicate considerations, because there is always the risk that there is someone else behind the madman,” Italian Education Minister Giuseppe Valditara told reporters. “Given that so many schools are involved, the real risk is almost non-existent.”

At Rome’s Mamiani high school, students poured into the streets, mistaking the alarm for the recess bell. They learned of the bomb threat only after they were outside.

“They are saying it was a bomb alert because an email arrived from Russian hackers in which they said they would have killed everyone. It was pretty violent,” said Anita Bartocci, an 18-year-old student.

Hoax pattern emerges

Bomb threats targeted dozens of flights across Europe last week, following a string of hoaxes that forced flight diversions and left airlines scrambling to keep passengers safe and minimize disruption.

False bomb threats are relatively common, but so many in such a short period are unusual. No suspicious items were found and no one was injured. Still, the threats raised concerns because they followed other disruptions across Europe, including attacks on supermarket refrigeration systems and drone incursions.

Defense Minister Guido Crosetto said the emailed threats were aimed at “sowing terror, or creating concern.”

“It’s too easy. Any one of us can use the available means and instruments to send an email to a school, a daycare, an airline, saying that there’s a bomb,” Crosetto told reporters at an event Wednesday.

Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said Saturday that his personal data had been leaked to the dark web, an encrypted part of the internet. PM Meloni blamed pro-Russian hackers.

The company overseeing construction of the Brenner Base Tunnel, which will connect Austria and Italy, also said over the weekend that it had been hacked last month.

World

World Leaders Urge Stronger and Faster Action at UN Climate Talks Over Inadequate Response

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plants an olive sapling ahead of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit at the 31st United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye. (Kiara Worth/UN Climate Change/dpa)
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plants an olive sapling ahead of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit at the 31st United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye. (Kiara Worth/UN Climate Change/dpa)
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World Leaders Urge Stronger and Faster Action at UN Climate Talks Over Inadequate Response

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plants an olive sapling ahead of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit at the 31st United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye. (Kiara Worth/UN Climate Change/dpa)
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan plants an olive sapling ahead of the World Leaders Climate Action Summit at the 31st United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP31) in Antalya, Türkiye. (Kiara Worth/UN Climate Change/dpa)

World leaders called for urgent and decisive action on global warming Wednesday as formal talks began at the United Nations climate conference in Türkiye, saying the crisis is disproportionately harming some of the world’s most vulnerable countries.

“You might as well bomb us. That might have been easier than watching climate change tear apart our homes piece by piece,” said Surangel Whipps Jr., president of the island nation of Palau. “We are at war with a crisis we did not create. A war no peace treaty can end, only urgent action can.”

The annual summit follows a year of deadly floods, heat waves and other disasters. Leaders said geopolitical conflicts had diverted attention from climate change.

Leaders of the world’s three biggest polluting nations — China, the United States and India, which together account for more than half of global carbon dioxide emissions — skipped the summit at COP31.

Their absence left a handful of national leaders and UN officials to press for action as a new report warned of a widening gap between countries’ climate pledges and actual emissions cuts.

Scientists say global warming is likely to exceed 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above preindustrial levels. Limiting warming to that threshold was a goal of the 2015 Paris Agreement and remains a focus of international negotiations.

“We know the truth. Now we must act on it because climate action is more than a fight over a number or a thermometer,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said in an opening speech. “We are in the fight for our lives and our children’s future.”

'Every fraction of a degree counts'

Guterres outlined a framework for climate negotiations, saying they must prioritize ending fossil fuel reliance, adapting to a warmer world, increasing financial support for poorer countries bearing the brunt of climate change, and promoting cooperation over conflict.

“We do not need countries to agree on everything. But we do need them to cooperate on the things no country can solve alone,” he said.

But addressing climate change has been overshadowed by wars, inflation and geopolitical conflicts, Brazil's President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said. He pledged to protect the Amazon, the world’s largest rainforest, and urged world leaders to work together for a just, sustainable future.

“Brazil is back to defend the continuity of a healthy planet,” he said.

Micronesian President Wesley Simina said his country is already suffering irreversible losses of coral reefs that “protect our shores, sustain our fisheries, feed our families and carry the stories and traditions of our communities.”

He called climate change the “single greatest threat to the security, livelihoods, and well-being of Pacific peoples, but perhaps worse than what we’ve already experienced is what has yet to come” as temperatures continue to rise.

“Every fraction of a degree counts. Every fraction avoided reduces risk. Every year in which we can slow the rate of warming provides more time for adaptation and reduces the pressure on ecosystems that are approaching their limits,” he said. “This is why the world must act not only deeply, but quickly.”

Amy Pope, director general of the International Organization for Migration, called for more funding to help communities adapt to climate change and build resilience.

Climate change displaced almost 30 million people in 2025, while hundreds of millions more live in places unprepared to withstand future risks, Pope told The Associated Press on the sidelines of the summit.

“The issue that policymakers fail to understand is that making these investments in building resilience to climate in these vulnerable communities will actually save millions of dollars, millions of lives in the end,” she said.

Leaders of some major polluting nations absent

More than 70 world leaders and senior government officials are speaking at the summit, though what can be accomplished remains uncertain in the absence of leaders from key nations.

“It really is a disgrace that just one of the seven G7 heads of state and only a handful of G20 leaders are attending this summit,” said Mohamed Adow, director of Power Shift Africa, a climate and energy think tank. “The world’s biggest economies should be leading the response to the climate crisis, not leaving it to others.”

The United States, the world’s second-largest polluter after China, is absent from the talks for the second consecutive year. President Donald Trump, who has called climate change a hoax, has targeted offshore wind projects and removed rules limiting power plant emissions.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen attended, but many leaders of European countries stayed away.

“More than half of the top leaders of the EU countries are not showing up at the leaders’ summit,” Climate Action Network Europe Director Chiara Martinelli told The Associated Press. “If Europe wants to help steer the global transition, it needs to show up and be part of it.”

Conference colored by fears over speed of climate action

The gap between nations’ climate plans and action on the ground is widening, according to an annual climate change performance index published Wednesday by Germanwatch and the New Climate Institute.

“Overall, current collective efforts are not enough to prevent catastrophic climate change. But we see clear potential for improvement,” said Jan Burck of Germanwatch.

COP31 host Türkiye and Australia, which is leading the negotiations, ranked among the worst performers in curbing emissions.

The talks come as the war in Iran has driven up global prices for oil, gasoline and products such as fertilizers and pesticides, prompting governments to rethink energy policies and investment in renewable sources such as wind and solar.

Past talks have been criticized for producing promises that later went unfulfilled.

Delegates at the 2023 conference in Dubai agreed to transition away from fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas, the main drivers of climate change. But subsequent conferences in Azerbaijan and Brazil yielded little agreement on how to reduce their use. Last year’s conference in Brazil produced a compromise deal pledging more money to help vulnerable nations adapt to climate change.