Facebook has shared an update with regards to how it is dealing with what it calls “movements and organizations tied to violence” on its platforms.
“Today we are taking action against Facebook Pages, Groups, and Instagram accounts tied to offline anarchist groups that support violent acts amidst protests, US-based militia organizations and QAnon,” read the statement.
Going forward, Facebook says it will look for cues of political violence in Groups and even conversations among users, and would limit the reach of a certain Facebook Page or Group accordingly.
Individuals supporting controversial groups such as Antifa won’t have their posts removed, but the reach will be greatly curtailed and it would also be hard to spread such content across the platforms.
“While we will allow people to post content that supports these movements and groups, so long as they do not otherwise violate our content policies, we will restrict their ability to organize on our platform,” says Facebook. Any Group belonging to a movement such as Antifa or discusses potential violence would be completely removed from the platform.
A Group, Page or an Instagram account that is associated with any violent movements will not be recommended to users. They will, for instance, no longer be a part of “Groups you may want to join” recommendations on Facebook.
Taking shadow banning and sly censorship to another level, Facebook would greatly reduce the rankings of the content posted from such Groups. Facebook users, despite being part of such Groups or Pages, would see content posted in them less frequently over time.
Even monetization and Facebook Marketplace features are also disabled for such pages, preventing them from making money through the platform. Moreover, non-profit organizations in favor of these movements will also be prevented from leveraging the platform’s fundraising tools.
Facebook said that it would continue to “review content and accounts against all of our content policies in an effort to keep people safe.
“As a result of some of the actions we’ve already taken, we’ve removed over 790 Groups, 100 Pages, and 1500 ads tied to QAnon from Facebook, blocked over 300 hashtags across Facebook and Instagram, and additionally imposed restrictions on over 1,950 Groups and 440 Pages on Facebook and over 10,000 accounts on Instagram,” wrote Facebook.
