Vietnam urges Google, Meta to mandate AI-driven content monitoring on social platforms – Tech

Vietnam has ordered cross-border social media platforms to employ AI models for automatically detecting and removing “toxic” content, as reported by state media.

This move represents Vietnam’s latest effort to enforce strict regulations on social media companies such as Facebook (Meta), YouTube (Google), and TikTok, urging them to eliminate offensive, false, and anti-state content.

During the information ministry’s mid-year review event, Vietnam Television (VTV) reported that this is the first time Vietnam has officially announced such a requirement. However, specific details regarding the implementation timeline were not provided.

In response to government requests, Facebook removed 2,549 posts, YouTube took down 6,101 videos, and TikTok eliminated 415 links in the first half of this year, according to the information ministry.

This directive aligns with the ongoing development of governance and ethics guidelines for AI in Southeast Asian countries, aiming to establish “guardrails” for the advancing technology, as reported by Reuters.

Vietnam has implemented various regulations in recent years, including a cybersecurity law, specifically targeting foreign social media platforms to combat news disinformation. The country also seeks to compel foreign tech firms to establish representative offices and store data within Vietnam.

A comprehensive inspection of TikTok’s local operations was conducted last month, revealing preliminary findings of “various” violations, as stated by the information ministry.

During the mid-year review event, the information ministry announced that Netflix has submitted the necessary documents to open a local office in Vietnam, as reported by VTV.