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Facebook and Twitter are taking action against a group of Russia-backed actors who are allegedly interfering with the presidential election campaign online.
Russia is reportedly paying folks based in Ghana and Nigeria to spread divisive disinformation specifically targeting Black Americans, according to a CNN investigation.
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The activity of this sinister Russian troll farm focused on the hot topics within the culture, such as postings about Black history, civil rights and LGBTQ issues, Nathaniel Gleicher, Facebook’s head of security policy, said in a blog post.
On Thursday, Facebook announced it had removed 49 accounts and 69 pages from its site, and 85 accounts from Instagram, which it owns, due to foreign interference.
The company said the Internet Research Agency (IRA), which, for years, has used social media platforms to manipulate US elections, was behind the accounts.
“This network was in the early stages of building an audience and was operated by local nationals — some wittingly and some unwittingly — in Ghana and Nigeria on behalf of individuals in Russia,” Facebook said. “It targeted primarily the United States.”
The Facebook pages amassed over 13,000 followers, and about 265,000 users were following the Instagram accounts, CNET.com reports. While a majority of the followers were in the US, Facebook said the accounts didn’t appear to be posting about elections.
Twitter suspended 71 accounts operating from Ghana and Nigeria that were “largely Tweeting in English and that presented themselves as based in the United States,” the company said.
“These 71 removed accounts, operating out of Ghana and Nigeria and which we can reliably associate with Russia, attempted to sow discord by engaging in conversations about social issues, like race and civil rights,” Twitter wrote.
Our top priority is keeping people safe. In collaboration with law enforcement, industry peers, journalists, and expert researchers, we recently suspended a small network of accounts largely Tweeting in English and that presented themselves as based in the United States.
— Twitter Safety (@TwitterSafety) March 12, 2020
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The crackdown effort was tied to individuals associated with the online election interference during the US presidential election in 2016.
“We’re constantly working to detect and stop this type of activity,” Gleicher said in his blog post, “because we don’t want our services to be used to manipulate people.”
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