Facebook announced on Jan. 11 that it will remove all references to “stop stealing elections” before Joe Biden’s inauguration.
Facebook announced Monday (Jan. 11) that it will remove all references to “Stop Vote Stealing” before President-elect Joe Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20.
In a statement, Facebook said it is removing content containing the phrase “Stop the Steal,” a slogan used by supporters of President Trump to question the integrity of the 2020 election. The slogan “Stop the Steal” is a slogan used by Trump supporters to question the integrity of the 2020 election. After the Nov. 3 presidential election, Trump supporters across the U.S. held several rallies in the name of “Stop the Steal.
The social media company said the move was made to remove content that “could further incite violence in the coming weeks. The content will be removed in accordance with the company’s Coordinating Harm policy.
“We have always allowed for a robust conversation about the election results and will continue to do so,” said Guy Rosen, vice president of Facebook, and Monika Bickert, head of product policy, in a statement.
“However, violence may result from ongoing attempts to organize against the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. In addition, people involved in last Wednesday’s violence in Washington, D.C., used the term, so we are taking this additional step ahead of the inauguration.”
This comes as large technology companies have begun to tighten regulation of content on their platforms, citing the need to avoid potential harm. The companies began the latest round of content censorship after sporadic riots and violence disrupted an otherwise peaceful protest in front of the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6.
A group of rioters and a handful of protesters, waving American flags and Trump banners, illegally broke into the Capitol. At the time, members of Congress were counting electoral votes in a joint session of Congress. The day’s clashes left five people dead (three died for medical reasons) and dozens of police officers injured.
Facebook said the company has a team working 24/7 to enforce the policy until around Jan. 20. The team has removed a large number of posts, they said.
“We will keep our Integrity Operations Center operational through at least Jan. 22 to monitor and respond to threats in real time.” The company said.
Until then, the company has suspended Trump’s account indefinitely and also terminated ads about politics and elections in the U.S. It said it would retain some measures and restrictions put in place before the U.S. election, such as not recommending people to join civic groups.
The company added that it will add a “news summary” feature to the platform’s news section so that users can “find reliable news.
Facebook, Twitter and other Silicon Valley companies have targeted content on their platforms, raising concerns that the tech giants lack checks and balances and that their decisions could undermine the rights guaranteed by the First Amendment.
There has been much discussion over the past year about whether to reform or eliminate Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996, which imposes legal protections on companies that engage in censorship or political behavior.
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) also expressed concern about Twitter’s decision to suspend Trump’s activities on social media, saying it could set a precedent for the tech giant to suppress free speech.
“We understand this current practice of permanently suspending his account, but when companies like Facebook and Twitter can exercise unfettered power to remove people from platforms that have become integral to the speech of billions of people, everyone should be concerned,” the ACLU wrote in a statement , “especially when the political realities that make these decisions easier.”
Apple, Google and Amazon have also attracted widespread attention for taking down, from their services, the social media Parler, which attracts a large following of classical liberal and conservative users, and which has filed a lawsuit against Amazon in an attempt to reverse the company’s decision.
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