Facebook has expanded its Artificial Intelligence (AI) tool to prevent suicides outside of US (except the European Union), it said in a blogpost. The social media giant said in its post that it is using pattern recognition to detect posts or live videos (Facebook Live) where someone might be expressing thoughts of suicide and to help respond to reports faster. The company has rolled out this tool in March this year, but at that time a Facebook user or a Facebook friend was required to help the victim. Now, Facebook has upgraded the tool, and now it connects people with first responders like local police- minimizing the need of involving Facebook user/friend. Post detection, Facebook provides people with a number of support options, such as the option to reach out to a friend and even offer suggested text templates. "We also suggest contacting a help line and offer other tips and resources for people to help themselves in that moment," the blog said. Facebook has a team, who review reports that come in and prioritize the most serious reports based on the points detected by the AI tool. To detect users intending to self-harm or commit suicide, Facebook's technology uses signals like the text used in the post and comments (for example, comments like “Are you ok?” and “Can I help?” can be strong indicators). "In some instances, we have found that the technology has identified videos that may have gone unreported," the company adds in its blog post. Social network's team…
