The United States government officials and intelligence authorities will meet executives from top Silicon Valley companies on Friday to discuss ways to restrict the use of social media by militant groups, Reuters reported. After the terror attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, the US wants technology firms to do more to combat online propaganda from groups such as the Islamic State, according to the report.

Silicon Valley giants such as Twitter, Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Dropbox will participate in the summit, where social media content will be the focus. They will discuss ways to make it harder for militants to recruit and mobilise followers through social media platforms, and how technology can be used to identify online recruitment patterns.

US President Barack Obama in December had urged technology and law enforcement leaders to “make it harder for terrorists to use technology to escape from justice”. Tech firms have also been cooperative and removed content considered provocative. Last week, Twitter updated its policies to explicitly prohibit “hateful conduct”. Similar steps have been taken by other websites in the past 18 months, said the report.