Facebook Community Standards
Policies that outline what is and isn't allowed on the Facebook app.
Meta Advertising Standards
Policies for ad content and business assets.
Other policies
Other policies that apply to Meta technologies.
How Meta improves
How we update our policies, measure results, work with others and more.
Our approach to elections
How we help prevent interference, empower people to vote and more.
Our approach to misinformation
How we work with independent fact-checkers, and more, to identify and take action on misinformation.
Our approach to newsworthy content
How we assess content for newsworthiness.
Our approach to ranking
How we reduce problematic content in News Feed.
Community Standards enforcement report
Quarterly report on how well we're doing at enforcing our policies in the Facebook app and on Instagram.
Intellectual property
Report on how well we're helping people protect their intellectual property.
Government requests for user data
Report on government request for people's data.
Content restrictions based on local law
Report on when we restrict content that's reported to us as violating local law.
Internet disruptions
Report on intentional Internet restrictions that limit people's ability to access the Internet.
Widely viewed content report
Quarterly report on what people see on Facebook, including the content that receives the widest distribution during the quarter.
Regulatory and other transparency reports
Download current and past regulatory reports for Facebook and Instagram.
Suicide and self-injury
Policy details
Change log
CHANGE LOG
Change log
Today
Current version
28 Apr 2022
30 Sep 2021
4 May 2020
17 Dec 2020
18 Nov 2020
30 Jul 2020
1 Jul 2019
26 Apr 2019
20 Mar 2019
31 Aug 2018
Policy rationale
We care deeply about the safety of the people who use our apps. We regularly consult with experts in suicide and self-injury to help inform our policies and enforcement, and work with organisations around the world to provide assistance to people in distress.
While we do not allow people to intentionally or unintentionally celebrate or promote suicide or self-injury, we do allow people to discuss these topics because we want Facebook to be a space where people can share their experiences, raise awareness about these issues, and seek support from one another.
We define self-injury as the intentional and direct injuring of the body, including self-mutilation and eating disorders. We remove any content that encourages suicide or self-injury, including fictional content such as memes or illustrations and any self-injury content that is graphic, regardless of context. We also remove content that identifies and negatively targets victims or survivors of suicide or self-injury seriously, humorously or rhetorically, as well as real-time depictions of suicide or self-injury. Content about recovery of suicide or self-harm that is allowed, but may contain imagery that could be upsetting, such as a healed scar, is placed behind a sensitivity screen.
When people post or search for suicide or self-injury-related content, we will direct them to local organisations that can provide support, and if our Community Operations team is concerned about immediate harm, we will contact local emergency services to get them help. For more information, visit the Facebook Safety Centre.
With respect to live content, experts have told us that if someone is saying they intend to attempt suicide on a live-stream, we should leave the content up for as long as possible, because the longer someone is talking to a camera, the more opportunity there is for a friend or family member to call emergency services.
However, to minimise the risk of others being negatively affected by viewing this content, we will stop the live-stream at the point at which the threat turns into an attempt. As mentioned above, in any case, we will contact the emergency services if we identify that someone is at immediate risk of harming themselves.
Do not post:
- Suicide.
- Self-injury.
- Eating disorders.
Content that depicts graphic self-injury imagery
It is against our policies to post content depicting a person who engaged in a suicide attempt or death by suicide
Content that focuses on depiction of ribs, collar bones, thigh gaps, hips, concave stomach or protruding spine or scapula when shared together with terms associated with eating disorders
Content that contains instructions for drastic and unhealthy weight loss when shared together with terms associated with eating disorders.
Content that mocks victims or survivors of suicide, self-injury or eating disorders who are either publicly known or implied to have experienced suicide or self-injury
For the following content, we restrict content to adults over the age of 18, and include a sensitivity screen so that people are aware that the content may be upsetting:
- Photos or videos depicting a person who engaged in euthanasia/assisted suicide in a medical setting.
For the following content, we include a sensitivity screen so that people are aware that the content may be upsetting to some:
- Content that depicts older instances of self-harm such as healed cuts or other non-graphic self-injury imagery in a self-injury, suicide or recovery context.
- Content that depicts ribs, collar bones, thigh gaps, hips, concave stomach or protruding spine or scapula in a recovery context.
We provide resources to people who post written or verbal admissions of engagement in self-injury, including:
- Suicide.
- Euthanasia/assisted suicide.
- Self-harm.
- Eating disorders.
- Vague, potentially suicidal statements or references (including memes or stock imagery about sad mood or depression) in a suicide or self-injury context.
For the following Community Standards, we require additional information and/or context to enforce:
- We may remove suicide notes when we have confirmation of a suicide or suicide attempt. We try to identify suicide notes using several factors, including, but not limited to, family or legal representative requests, media reports, law enforcement reports or other third-party sources (e.g. government agencies, NGOs).
- A suicide note may also be removed when reported through the Suicidal content contact form or Instagram contact form when we have confirmation of a suicide or suicide attempt
User experiencesSee some examples of what enforcement looks like for people on Facebook, such as: what it looks like to report something that you don't think should be on Facebook, to be told that you've violated our Community Standards and to see a warning screen over certain content.
Note: We're always improving, so what you see here may be slightly outdated compared to what we currently use.
DataPrevalence
Percentage of times that people saw violating content
Content actioned
Number of pieces of violating content that we took action on
Proactive rate
Percentage of violating content that we found before people reported it
Appealed content
Number of pieces of content that people appealed after we took action on it
Restored content
Number of pieces of content that we restored after we originally took action on it
Prevalence
Percentage of times that people saw violating content
Content actioned
Number of pieces of violating content that we took action on
Proactive rate
Percentage of violating content that we found before people reported it
Appealed content
Number of pieces of content that people appealed after we took action on it
Restored content
Number of pieces of content that we restored after we originally took action on it
Reporting
1
Universal entry point
We have an option to report, whether it's on a post, a comment, a story, a message or something else.
2
Getting started
We help people report things that they don't think should be on our platform.
3
Select a problem
We ask people to tell us more about what's wrong. This helps us send the report to the right place.
4
Report submitted
After these steps, we submit the report. We also lay out what people should expect next.
Post-report communication
1
Update via notifications
After we've reviewed the report, we'll send the reporting user a notification.
2
More detail in the Support Inbox
We'll share more details about our review decision in the Support Inbox. We'll notify people that this information is there and send them a link to it.
3
Appeal option
If people think we made the wrong decision, they can request another review.
4
Post-appeal communication
We'll send a final response after we've re-reviewed the content, again to the Support Inbox.
Takedown experience
1
Immediate notification
When someone posts something that violates our Community Standards, we'll tell them.
2
Additional context
We'll also address common misperceptions around enforcement.
3
Explain the policy
We'll give people easy-to-understand explanations about why their content was removed.
4
Ask for input
After we've established the context for our decision and explained our policy, we'll ask people what they'd like to do next, including letting us know if they think we made a mistake.
5
Tell us more
If people disagree with the decision, we'll ask them to tell us more.
6
Set expectations
Here, we set expectations on what will happen next.
Enforcement
We have the same policies around the world, for everyone on Facebook.
Review teams
Our global team of over 15,000 reviewers work every day to keep people on Facebook safe.
Stakeholder engagement
Outside experts, academics, NGOs and policymakers help inform the Facebook Community Standards.
Get help with suicide and self-injuryLearn what you can do if you see something on Facebook that goes against our Community Standards.
