Xi Jinping’s name wrongly translated by Facebook as ‘Mr. Shithole’

Facebook was in the eye of the storm after it wrongly translated Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s name as “Mr. Shithole” in its post.

Facebook wrongly translated President Xi Jinping’s name as Mr. Shithole.

The gaffe happened by Facebook when the post was being translated into English from Burmese.

However, Facebook issued an apology instantaneously and assured that the problem has fixed.

President Xi Jinping was on a visit to Myanmar where he and Aung San Suu Kyi signed dozens of agreements covering various infrastructure plans.

The error highlighted after a note published on Aung Sab Suu Kyi’s official Facebook page flooded with references to Xi Jinping as “Mr. Shithole” when translated to English from Burmese.

“Mr. Shithole, President of China arrives at 4 PM,” the translated Facebook post read.

Facebook issued apology for wrongly translating President Xi Jinping’s name

A local newspaper called the Irrawady also published a headline which read, Dinner honours president shithole.

Things went awry for Facebook when Google’s translation services did not show the same error.

“We fixed a technical issue that caused incorrect translations from Burmese to English on Facebook.”

“This should not have happened and we are taking steps to ensure it doesn’t happen again.”

“We sincerely apologize for the offence this has caused”, Facebook said in its defence.

The company claimed that it didn’t have Xi Jinping’s name in its database in Burmese and went with its translation.

We are aware of an issue regarding Burmese to English translations on Facebook, and we’re doing everything we can to fix this as quickly as possible, a Facebook spokesperson quoted.

However, this is not the first time Facebook is in news for something related to the website and Myanmar.

In 2018, Facebook had admitted that it didn’t do enough to prevent its social network to incite violence in the country.

As per a report, Facebook failed to acknowledge numerous warnings from various organizations in Myanmar about social media posts inciting violence against the minority such as the Rohingya Muslims.

However, Facebook assured that it has taken necessary actions against the hateful content that spread through their platform.

They claimed that they reviewed over 64000 pieces that violated its hate speech policies.

A case that made headlines back then was an anti-Muslim Facebook post that called for genocide.

When translated from Burmese to English, it read, I shouldn’t have a rainbow in Myanmar.