Christchurch Call partners with ROOST for open-source AI tools to tackle TVEC

The Christchurch Call is partnering with the newly formed ROOST consortium to intensify efforts to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content online (TVEC). 

Google, OpenAI, Roblox, and Discord formed the non-profit consortium to improve child safety online. The initiative (Robust Open Online Safety Tools), launched in Paris at the AI Action Summit, aims to make core safety technologies more accessible for companies and provide free, open-source AI tools for identifying, reviewing, and reporting child sexual abuse material. 

The Christchurch Call is partnering with ROOST to do the same for terrorist and extremist content (TVEC) online.  

“We’re delighted to partner with ROOST to develop more technical and information-based solutions to help the Christchurch Call Community deliver the commitments in the Call,” Christchurch Call Foundation Chief Executive Paul Ash said.  

“This is a prime example of the power of our multistakeholder approach to prevent terrorist and violent extremist content online. This is a shared challenge. Teaming up, we can make good progress. 

“We look forward to engaging our widespread community in this work,” Ash said. 

The partnership will help Call supporters meet the Call commitments to eliminate TVEC online, by providing AI tools for smaller online service providers to build their TVEC handling capacity.  

Efforts will focus on developing effective interventions, based on trusted information sharing about algorithms, to redirect users from terrorist and violent extremist content. 

The partnership will also accelerate research into and development of technical solutions to prevent the upload of, and to detect and immediately remove, terrorist and violent extremist content online, and share these solutions through open channels, drawing on expertise from academia, researchers, and civil society. 

 Editor notes 

About ROOST 
Robust Open Online Safety Tools (ROOST) is a non-profit, community-driven effort to build scalable and resilient safety infrastructure for the AI era. Many organisations—big and small—still lack access to basic safety resources, hindering innovation and putting users at risk. ROOST develops, maintains, and distributes open-source building blocks to safeguard global users and communities.  

About the Christchurch Call 
The Christchurch Call was launched after a terrorist attack on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand killed 51 people and injured 50. The attack was designed for the internet and was livestreamed. Our multistakeholder Call Community includes leaders from governments, the tech industry, and civil society with a shared commitment to eliminate terrorist and violent extremist content online. The Christchurch Call Foundation is a non-profit, non-government organisation which acts as secretariat.