Facebook has some serious explaining to do. Just hours before Friday’s massacre in Paris, someone at Facebook deleted a group that was actively working to smoke out accounts with ties to the Islamic State. Fortunately, the group was restored shortly afterward.
It’s well documented that ISIS relies heavily on social media to recruit members and spread its message of jihad. We know, for instance, about the numerous grisly YouTube videos of ISIS thugs beheading hostages. But a Brookings Institution study released this past March revealed just how big ISIS’ social media presence really is. The study pinpointed at least 46,000 ISIS-related accounts on Twitter. While nearly all social media sites have officially closed their doors to terrorist organizations, snuffing out terrorist profiles quickly turns into a game of whack-a-mole.
Red Cult, a group aligned with Anonymous, decided to help Facebook and Twitter along. After the Charlie Hebdo attacks, Red Cult started a campaign called “Operation ISIS”–or “#OpISIS” for short–to smoke out social media accounts used by ISIS. However, on Friday afternoon, Red Cult got a rude surprise. A Facebook group it used to smoke out ISIS-related accounts on numerous social media platforms called “Report ISIS Accounts” was deleted, and its administrators were slapped with a three-day ban.
Anonymous announced the deletion on YouTube. Watch here.
The group claims to have unmasked and nuked thousands of ISIS-related accounts on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media platforms. Apparently some pro-ISIS troll decided to retaliate by reporting the group for violating Facebook’s community standards. Never mind that the group was reporting accounts that violate the terms of use for nearly all legitimate social media platforms. Facebook, for instance, not only forbids groups that engage in “terrorist activity” from having any presence there, but also bans any content “supporting or praising” terrorist organizations or their leaders.
This would have been a horrible mistake in any case. However, in a case of particularly atrocious timing, the deletion came just hours before the launch of the Paris massacre, for which ISIS has claimed responsibility. Apparently someone at Facebook headquarters in Menlo Park, California who didn’t have his head up his rear must have realized how this potentially would have looked. Within hours of the attacks, the group was restored without any explanation.
The fact “Report ISIS Accounts” was finally restored doesn’t make Facebook’s actions any less outrageous. How in the world do you justify nuking a group that is actually helping smoke out accounts that are aiding and abetting terrorism? Unless Facebook has a really good explanation for what happened–and I doubt there is one–whoever was responsible for this needs to be out of a job–after he or she apologizes.
Needless to say, Anonymous isn’t backing down one inch. The next morning, a francophone Anonymous member announced that Anonymous would smoke out and snuff out ISIS and its followers. Watch here.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w49NCXhq0YI
Partial translation, courtesy of Reuters:
“These attacks cannot remain unpunished. Anonymous from all over the world will hunt you down. You should know that we will find you and we will not let you go. We will launch the biggest operation ever against you. Expect massive cyber attacks. War is declared. Get prepared.”
Hopefully Facebook will get out of the way and let Anonymous help it smoke out terrorism.
