Facebook wants to prevent arms sales between private individuals on its network

In addition, the ban on peer-to-peer gun sales also includes language which bans the sale of ammunition as well as gun parts, a Facebook spokeswoman was quoted by The Washington Post as having said.

As the USA continues to debate about gun control following a string of mass shootings that plagued the country at the end of 2015, Facebook has made its stance on the issue clear, banning users from coordinating “peer-to-peer” sales of firearms on both the social media network and Instagram, a spokeswoman announced Friday.

Facebook is a burgeoning marketplace, it would seem.

In a statement obtained by the Times, Facebook head of product policy Monika Bickert said, “Over the last two years, more and more people have been using Facebook to discover products and to buy and sell things to one another”.

We “updating our rules for regulated products to reflect this development”, she adds. It could allow for quick and timely identification with few errors (over time).

A Facebook user advertises an AR-15 for sale.

Facebook, the largest social network in the world with more than 1.5 billion users, also said its policies prohibit users from selling marijuana, pharmaceuticals and illegal drugs, according to a statement released by the company. The New York Times reports that the ban is meant to prevent unlicensed gun transactions in which the sites’ users conduct private person-to-person sales. “For example, private sellers of firearms in the USA will not be permitted to specify ‘no background check required, ‘ nor can they offer to transact across state lines without a licensed firearms dealer”. The policies were last reviewed two years ago.

Moreover, Facebook’s prohibition came in a countering effort against rising concerns that its services were increasingly being used to thwart background checks on gun purchases.

Shannon Watts, of the Everytown for Gun Safety campaign group, told Associated Press, that Facebook “was unfortunately and unwittingly serving as an online platform for unsafe people to get guns”.