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Facebook opens UK engineering hub to fight harmful content

FILE - In this March 29, 2018, file photo, the logo for social media giant Facebook, appears on screens at the Nasdaq MarketSite, in New York's Times Square. Facebook on Tuesday, June 11, 2019, launched an app that will pay users to share information with the social media giant about which apps they're using. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File)

LONDON — Facebook is opening an engineering centre in London that will build tech tools aimed at keeping harmful content off its site.

The U.S. social network’s announcement Wednesday comes as governments put more pressure on the big tech companies to better police their platforms.

The company said in a statement it will add more than 500 new tech jobs, including 100 in artificial intelligence, for the new hub by the end of the year.

It said “a significant number” of the new jobs will be in the company’s community integrity team, which works on stopping spam and abuse and addressing violence and personal safety.

One of the team’s responsibilities is building advanced software and artificial intelligence systems to detect and remove harmful behaviour such as malicious content and fake accounts.

The Associated Press