In a sweep designed to target misinformation, Facebook has deleted a number of fake Trump supporters account’s. As reported by NBC, Facebook deleted hundreds of fake accounts spreading misinformation about COVID-19.
Facebook has long been under pressure to better target misinformation and hate speech. Most recently U.S. Attorney’s called on the company to offer live responses to hate speech. In their report, it claimed Facebook prioritized freedom of expression over hate speech.
Facebook has also been under pressure from advertisers. Many of which boycotted the company in July and some of them for good. This, therefore, looks to be a step in the right direction for the company. Having deleted a number of fake Trump supporters accounts Facebook will receive backlash but at least the company is taking meaningful action.
Facebook sweep results in deletion of fake accounts
The accounts in question relate to a foreign troll farm. This group is posing as African-American supports of Donald Trump and QAnon. The sweep also deleted hundreds of fake accounts linked to conservative media outlet The Epoch Times.
This outlet pushed pro-Trump conspiracy theories about coronavirus and protests in the U.S. Facebook was able to take down the accounts as it violated inauthentic behavior guidelines.
Some wish the company went further with sanctions against the troll farms. However, Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of security policy, said the troll farm’s motivations were unclear.
He noted that the company was unable to determine “clear evidence of financial motivation” or “clear links to known commercial actors in this space.” Thus they were unable to bring further sanctions.
Therefore, Facebook has stressed that the accounts were taken down for their behavior, not their content. The accounts were deleted because they were fake, not because of the content they were posting.
Researchers at the Atlantic Council found the troll farm originated with a persona called “David Adrian”. This persona claimed to be both living in Montana and Romania and has since had multiple Facebook, Twitter and Instagram accounts linked to him removed.
Facebook delete accounts linked to Epoch Media Group
Separate to the “David Adrian” person is the troll operation of the Epoch Media Group. Facebook was able to tie 303 Facebook accounts, 181 pages, 44 Facebook groups and 31 Instagram accounts to the group. These accounts were followed by over 2 million people worldwide.
Gleicher said the accounts posted about “ongoing U.S. protests and conspiracy theories about who is behind them”. Many of them pushed conspiracy theories surrounding COVID-19. The outlet was previously banned from Facebook and this takedown has ceased much of its operations.
Reports suggest the group is still very active on social media through other means. Experts have linked a petition to “start calling the novel coronavirus the CCP virus,” to this outlet.
Facebook does not allow the Epoch Times to advertise on its site. This came about after the media outlet purchased ads under accounts like “Honest Paper” and “Pure Honest Journalism”. This was to get around Facebook’s ad review systems.
It is good to see Facebook finally taking some meaningful and firm action against misinformation. Clearly, there is a long way to got but this is one of the first steps by the looks of it.