Facebook censors photos of gold prospectors lying face down in a river after mistaking them for corpses

FACEBOOK has censored pictures of gold prospectors lying face down in a Scottish river after the company mistook them for corpses. The hilarious blunder happened after snaps were posted showing men dressed in black waterproof suits lying face down in the water. But Facebook, which has been widely accused of turning a blind eye to […]

FACEBOOK has censored pictures of gold prospectors lying face down in a Scottish river after the company mistook them for corpses.

The hilarious blunder happened after snaps were posted showing men dressed in black waterproof suits lying face down in the water.

Deadline News

Facebook censored the images, thinking these are corpses[/caption]

But Facebook, which has been widely accused of turning a blind eye to offensive material, placed a black screen on top of one of the picture, warning it might be graphic.

Facebook censorship then kicked in as what is believed to be a result of technology used to scan images for inappropriate content.

Facebook, over the blacked-out screen, wrote: “May show violent or graphic content.”

The measure does not stop the picture being viewed as Facebook users can see it by clicking the “uncover photo” link.

Facebook has faced severe and sustained criticism for failing to remove inappropriate content, including pages dedicated to drugs, weapons and terrorism.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced in a post last November that censoring will be dealt with by an independent body.

He said in his ‘Blueprint for Content Governance and Enforcement’: “In the next year, we’re planning to create a new way for people to appeal content decisions to an independent body, whose decisions would be transparent and binding.

“The purpose of this body would be to uphold the principle of giving people a voice while also recognising the reality of keeping people safe.”

A Facebook spokeswoman said: “It was mistakenly censored and the notice has since been removed.”

The gold prospectors in the pictures are excavating the riverbed in a technique known as sniping.

Sniping is the process where a person visually searches for gold underwater using a mask, snorkel and some excavating tools.

Deadline News

Photos of gold hunters prospecting in a Scottish river have been censored by Facebook[/caption]

Deadline News

Facebook censorship scanned the images and mistakenly deemed it was inappropriate content[/caption]

Deadline News

Snaps were posted showing men dressed in black waterproof suits lying face down in the water[/caption]