Facebook’s unveils AI-powered suicide prevention tools

Facebook suicide prevention tools

Facebook has unveiled new suicide prevention tools to help curb one of the leading causes of death among 15-29 year olds.

Unlike the social network’s earlier efforts that involved direct human intervention, the new tools rely on artificial intelligence (AI) to recognize patterns based on posts that have previously been associated with suicide. Through this mechanism, Facebook may surface more prominent options for friends who want to report a concerning post.

Facebook says that it’s testing pattern-recognition technology that automatically detects whether a post is “very likely to include thoughts of suicide.” Such post may even be manually checked by the company’s Community Operations team — even if it hasn’t been reported by a friend — and the individual may be offered support directly.

The new AI-powered tests are now rolling out in the U.S. and may, at some point, be extended to the rest of the world.

Facebook is also adding suicide prevention tools for video and Facebook Messenger. The “video integration” will enable users watching a livestreamed video to contact the person directly or report the livestream to Facebook.

Finally, thanks to Facebook’s partnership with various crisis support groups such as Crisis Text Line and the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline, those considering suicide will be able to quickly contact a specialist over Messenger.

According to the World Health Organization, there is one death by suicide every 40 seconds around the world. So yes, we are glad to see Facebook doing something about it.