MOSCOW, October 24 (RIA Novosti) - The UK government is currently in talks with national Internet providers to ensure they remove extremist propaganda appearing on the web, The Telegraph reported Friday.
According to the newspaper, providers BT and Virgin are to be obliged via court to eliminate extremist propaganda, with senior executives of such services as Twitter, Google and Facebook also being contacted by the authorities on the matter of taking action to reduce the activity of extremists online.
The Telegraph said that the steps were taken by British authorities in light of recent reports that UK high-profile radical Islamist preacher Anjem Choudary had influenced the alleged Ottawa shooter, Michael Zehaf-Bibeau.
The government reaction was also triggered by images and videos of UK and US hostages' execution distributed via social media.
According to the newspaper, UK authorities also want social media services to use "counter-speech" tactics that envisage positive messages about Islam on the Internet in order to stop extremists from monopolizing websites.
On October 22, a gunman shot dead a soldier guarding the National War Memorial in Ottawa and then proceeded to Parliament Hill's Center Block where he was killed in a shootout with a policeman.
