Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. Photo Credit: Anthony Quintano on Flickr, under Creative Commons license

Several big Canadian banks — namely the Bank of Montreal, Toronto-Dominion Bank, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, National Bank of Canada, Bank of Nova Scotia, and the famed Royal Bank of Canada — have said they’ll pause advertisements on Facebook platforms this month, joining a long list of companies that have recently agreed to a Facebook advertisement boycott campaign spearheaded by civil rights groups. The boycott, dubbed as the “Stop Hate for Profit” campaign centers on Facebook’s policies on content moderation and is primarily pressuring the company to take steps to block hate speech on its platforms. More than 400 brands so far have agreed to the advertisement boycott.

In response to the boycotts, Facebook has agreed to review its content moderation policies and has begun banning many violators, about 250 in number according to the company, from its platforms. Facebook has also opened itself to a civil rights audit. Pressure has surmounted on Facebook both from shareholders and the general public amid the sizeable number of advertisement pull-outs, not that Facebook is new to such pressures stemming from controversy anyways. This one, however, seems to be a very significant one for the company. Nevertheless, the company’s famed CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is apparently confident in its $70 billion annual ad business. He’s reported to have brushed away the threat of a boycott from major companies by stating that “my guess is that all these advertisers will be back on the platform soon enough.”