More and more Twitter accounts linked to the Trump campaign are being suspended. This time, it was the @TeamTrump election campaign account, along with White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany.
Their crime? Sharing an article by the New York Post which alleged Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, had business dealings with a Ukrainian energy company.
Twitter moved to stop people from sharing the story, saying it violated platform policies by using information contained via hacking, containing private information or putting people at risk of physical harm, .
Unsurprisingly there’s been backlash against the platform. Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey admitted the company handled the situation poorly by blocking the story without explanation, while President Trump has threatened legal action.
What does it take to get banned — and unbanned — from Twitter?
Twitter was one of the first major social media platforms to take a stance on political lobbying. Last year they banned political ads, and now hide tweets from influential users (elected officials, people running for office, and those with more than 100,000 followers) which violate the platform’s rules behind a warning.
This year, it added a fact check label to posts it deems misleading — a tool that has been repeatedly used on Trump’s tweets, especially with regard to mail-in ballots.
Accounts are suspended if a person distributes hacked material, as in the latest example, shares private information, attempts to manipulate the platform or election, spam users, impersonate others, or engages in hateful conduct.
In this case, accounts were unsuspended after the user deleted the offending tweet. Other times, the post is removed and the user banned for a set amount of time, usually between 12-24 hours.
Repeated violations of the rules can lead to a permanent ban, as in the case of far-right UK commentator Katie Hopkins for constantly posting “abuse and hate speech”.
Is what’s being done right?
Media lawyer Roger Blow told Crikey social media giants had taken a huge step in deciding to ban presidential posts.
“Marking the US president as having posted something unfactual was a big step,” he said, before adding it was a necessary one.
But, he said, there was a risk the bias and divisiveness of US media outlets could now emerge in social media, which each report a different version of the news.
“It’s a major problem, and in reality, there’s no difference between social media organisations and big media companies owned and controlled and directed by people with one or another political learning.
“The question is, are they deleting half the story, or policing the manner in which democratic political parties are putting forward their version of the truth? Either way, it has to be even-handed.”
Is Russia meddling again?
In short — yes.
Microsoft detected new cyber attacks by Russian, Chinese and Iranian hackers against hundreds of organisations and people involved in the 2020 presidential race. Russian organisation Strontium has already attacked more than 200 organisations including political campaigns, advocacy groups, parties and political consultants.
Facebook and Twitter have taken down a network of accounts connected to PeaceData, a progressive blogging site found to be linked to the Internet Research Agency (IRA), the notorious Russian troll farm.
The CIA has said Russian President Vladimir Putin is approving and orchestrating the interference to help Trump’s reelection.
Of course the Russkies are meddling in US affairs. And the CIA meddles in Russian affairs. So? Big deal, I don’t think. Far more dangerous are the Proud Boys and their ilk to the Yanks.
I’m far more concerned by amerika meddling in our public life.
They didn’t cease in 1975.
Too true B. And when you have the likes of Erica Betz consistently and regularly aping the GOP’s demonization of China, the LNP’s link to the GOP is in evidence.
Erica is so predictable, in lock step with his GOP fear mongering counterparts ie his outrageous and unapologetic McCarthyrist like questioning of Chinese Australian citizens in a recent Senate enquiry. Clearly Erica’s motive is to distract but at the same time to fire up the racist/”far right” component of the LNP’s base. But why just focus on Australian citizens with chinese parents, not force every Australian citizen with Vietnamese, Cambodian, Laotian, Cuban forbears to swear their loyalty? And why stop there, after all don’t Australian citizens from Scandinavian socialist, capitalism, racism regulating countries pose similar threats?
Erica’ s attempt to officially remove the “far right” term associated with domestic terror threats in Australia is not surprising, given his Amy Coney Barret like internet cleaning of references to his own “far right” membership of the on campus EU religious group he belonged to during his undergraduate days.
Amber, I would expect a Crikey journalist to do a little more research than quoting two propaganda pieces. One from Microsoft and the other from the New York Times. That is what “The Australian” and “Sydney Morning Herald do.
You failed to mention the most important bit of the Microsoft piece.
“While the political organizations targeted in attacks from these actors are not those that maintain or operate voting systems, this increased activity related to the U.S. electoral process is concerning for the whole ecosystem.”
The democratisation of information highlights the role the media used to play as an arbiter of truth. When a few companies control the narrative, and are held to account by each other for flights of fancy, we don’t have to worry too much about fake news. (That’s not too say it wasn’t there, but that it was limited by a mix of decorum and accountability.)
The internet poses a unique problem – information is completely unfiltered by the checks and balances expected of traditional news sources on which we rely. Instead what’s shareable (in turn, that’s agreeable to our prejudices) matters – so how does one even begin to talk about responsibility for the platforms responsible for the dissemination of information? And that’s not even getting into the misinformation campaigns that states and actors can inflict and are inflicting.
I don’t know what the solution is – any attempt to regulate it comes across like someone trying to regulate our conversations. It’s difficult to see how things could be made better when fake news is getting louder and louder.
Note to Ms Schultz:
At the point you mentioned Russian involvement being proven, I stopped reading.
Clearly you’re writing for your job – I thought you were a journalist.
Of course Russia is meddling in US politics. Some say infantile Trump was on his red phone to Vladimir Putin in a high emotional state …almost in tears pleading “help me Vlad, I need help!”
Bill, I loathe Trump/Putin and the whole fascist international they belong to, but we do ourselves a disservice when we repeat outlandish claims beginning with ‘some say …’. Who says? With what evidence? If we don’t ask these questions of claims that fit or promote our view of the world then we are just signing up for a shouting match that we can never win. Trump have media megaphones, the power of big money and a complete disregard of the truth on their side. We have nothing but reasoning, evidence and decency. These look like weak weapons at the moment, but they’re all we’ve got, so let’s hold on to them.