Twitter suspends 70,000 Trump supporter profiles for spreading conspiracy theories
Twitter has announced the permanent cancellation of more than 70,000 profiles from its platform. The decision responds to the spread of conspiracy theories and content related to the extreme right, according to the social network itself. The removal comes days after the assault on the Capitol by thousands of Donald Trump supporters.
Twitter justified the decision with a statement warning: "These accounts were dedicated to sharing harmful content associated with QAnon on a large scale", as well as "propagating its conspiracy theories". The administrators also add that many of the accounts were "managed by several people who administered other accounts at the same time".
Trump incited the uprising of his supporters at a rally in Washington at the same time that Joe Biden was to be confirmed as the next president by the lower house. Most of these incitements were made through Twitter, so the social network decided to permanently suspend Trump's official account.
"After a detailed review of recent tweets from the @realDonaldTrump account and the context surrounding them, we have permanently suspended the account due to the risk of further incitement to violence," the company itself announced in a tweet. With more than 88 million followers, the still president lost his main channel of communication in this way.
Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, supported the Twitter measure hours later. Zuckerberg issued a statement announcing the blocking of Trump's profiles on Facebook and Instagram. The blockade will remain in place "until the peaceful transition of power is completed," the social network's founder said.
This is not the first time that Twitter has pointed to Trump's publications. During the election campaign, the social network catalogued its tweets in which it accused electoral fraud as "deceptive" or directly "false". Beyond the allegations of fraud without evidence, the Trump Presidency has been marked by its activity via Twitter.
Through this platform he has launched messages not only against the institutions, but also against his Impeachment, COVID-19, Iran and the Black Lives Matter movement, among others. The still president has even committed several dismissals of members of his administration via Twitter.
Dissatisfied with the policies of moderation, as well as with the "lack of freedom of expression" of Twitter, thousands of the president's followers and supporters undertook the transfer to Parler. The social network, with somewhat more lax measures, was the alternative chosen by users previously expelled from platforms such as Facebook or Twitter who are looking for an uncensored space.
Defined as "the far-right social network", Parler increased its number of users eightfold compared to July after the US elections. However, Apple and Amazon removed the application from their download platform, a decision previously supported by Google. The search engine removed the application from its shop for incitement "to hatred and violence".
Parler must now find another hosting service or it will no longer work. However, several platforms are already acting as substitutes. Telegram, the direct competitor of WhatsApp - owned by Facebook- has increased the flow of users. So has Gab, another platform characterised by giving voice to far-right users.
A large number of network users supported the decision, but other authoritative voices have been sceptical of what they call "an act of censorship". German Chancellor Angela Merkel noted that "freedom of expression can be limited, but through the law and the legal framework defined by a legislature, not by a corporate decision".
Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and recently named as the world's greatest fortune, warned that many "will be unhappy with the West Coast's big techie companies being the arbiters of free speech.
The former Google consultant and one of the protagonists of the film 'The Social Dilemma' (2020), Joe Toscano, clarified that the companies' actions are equivalent to "admitting their responsibility for content", and that "it is now that we must talk about Section 230" of the Communications Decency Act.
This measure, passed in 1996 by the Clinton Administration and noted by Trump in May, details that an "interactive computer service" cannot be treated as the publisher or broadcaster of third-party content, a clause that protects websites from lawsuits if a user publishes something illegal, although there are exceptions for copyright violations, sex work-related material and violations of federal criminal law.
Other experts in the field such as Tristan Harris, a former Google Design Ethics specialist who also starred in the film, justifies and supports the decision by providing numerous pieces of evidence through his website. Harris claims that "false news spreads six times faster than true news, exposure to a conspiracy theory video reduces people's pro-social attitudes - such as their willingness to help others - and that every word of moral outrage added to a tweet increases the retweet rate by 17%".
Trump falsely accused members of the anti-fraud movement of being behind last week's assault on the Capitol during a private conversation with the House minority leader, according to Axios.
The House of Representatives is already accelerating its plans to remove the president from office. Vice President Pence is being pressured by Democrats to activate the 25th Amendment, a complex process that would make Trump unfit to serve as President.
In addition, Washington D.C. Attorney General Karl Racine has announced that he is considering filing charges against the outgoing president for inciting violence. At the same time, the FBI is warning of possible armed protests in the capital and other parts of the country following Biden's inauguration on 20 January.
