By Shadwa Hamza
Facebook and Twitter caught us off
guard right before the holiday season! The two platforms continued ongoing
investigations in political accounts and campaigns. These investigations led to
the removal of a large number of political accounts and pages, which manipulated
political influence campaigns.
Here is a breakdown of what each
platform did and how many accounts, pages, groups were removed.
Twitter Tops the Account Removal List
Twitter took down thousands of fake
accounts that were publishing fake and misleading content. The
280-character-per-post platform removed around 5,929 accounts originating from Saudi
Arabia.
"These accounts represent the
core portion of a larger network of more than 88,000 accounts engaged in spammy
behaviour across a wide range of topics. We have permanently suspended all of
these accounts from the service," Twitter
said in a statement.
Earlier this year, Twitter removed
almost 4,779 political accounts, most of whose activity was based in Iran.
Twitter and Saudi's Smaat
Smaat is
a Saudi Marketing Company which runs political and commercial operations. For
sometime, Twitter had its eyes on this company and focused its investigation on
it. What Twitter found out was that while Smaat might seem like a normal social
media management agency, it actually had some links to the Saudi Royal Family
and had recruited two former Twitter employees to search the platform's database
for information those who criticized the Saudi government.
Smaat created profiles that sent over
32 million tweets and gained millions of followers, according to a report by
Social Media Today. These fake profiles asked their followers to hit the follow
button or retweet their tweets which lead to creating sub-groups within the
networks, the report explained, noting that while the tweets seemed ordinary,
they actually included propaganda messages.
The Epoch Media Group Case
Facebook
also announced the removal of hundreds of accounts and pages that were related
to The Epoch Media Group, the head company of Falun Gong-related publication
and conservative news outlet The Epoch Times. The accounts and pages used fake
profile pictures which were generated by artificial intelligence. These
profiles were used across Facebook and Instagram. They targeted the United
States and Vietnam.
The 2020 US Presidential Election
With the
2020 US Presidential election looming, it is expected that Twitter and Facebook
will focus on and exert effort on this matter.
At Maverick, we expect this from
Facebook even more since users on the platform tend to create pages to spread
false and misleading news. “Pages that repeatedly publish or share
misinformation will see their distribution reduced and their ability to
monetize and advertise removed,” Facebook said in an official statement.
Facebook Goes on an Account Removal Spree
In terms of account removals, like Twitter, Facebook removed many accounts,
pages, groups, including Instagram accounts. Facebook removed 800 Pages and 36
Facebook accounts that were linked to Iranian-backed organizations.
Earlier
in the year, the platform also removed 265 Facebook and Instagram accounts, pages,
groups and events that were linked to Israel over coordinated inauthentic
behavior. The activity was based in Israel and focused on Togo, Nigeria, Niger
and Tunisia, according to Social Media Today. In addition, 137 Facebook and
Instagram accounts, pages and groups were removed since they were a part of a
domestic-focused network in the UK.
Conclusion
These account removals are a good
step for Facebook and Twitter, enhancing transparency from the social platforms
and limiting political propaganda.
With growing political campaigning
across social media, page owners as well as social media users in general are
urged and encouraged to the check the sources of the news they share.