Facebook activates Safety Check following Nigeria bombing

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[/blockquote]”We’ve activated Safety Check again after the bombing in Nigeria,” Those were the word of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in a Facebook post. “A loss of human life anywhere is a tragedy, and we’re committed to doing our part to help people in more of these situations.”

This comes days after the Social Media company was accused of White Supremacy tendencies when they activated Safety Check tool after the Paris attacks. While 4 million people marked themselves as “safe” with the tool, some users asked why the people-finder feature wasn’t used following other violent incidents, including a recent bombing in Beruit. Yesterday,  least 31 people were killed and 72 others injured in a bomb blast that ripped through the northeastern Nigerian city of Yola.

The company came out to defend its self and said that Facebook’s policy up until the Paris attacks was to activate the feature only for natural disasters. But Zuckerberg said that in the future, it will also be used for human disasters. Safety Check asks users if they are safe, and allows friends to view the responses.

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“We’re now working quickly to develop criteria for the new policy and determine when and how this service can be most useful,” Zuckerberg said Tuesday.

It’s unclear how often Facebook will activate the feature. But the response to the Nigeria bombing suggests it could be used much more widely.