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Apple and Google face new pressure to deform Parler, a social network founded as a less moderate and more conservative alternative to Facebook and Twitter. Activist group Sleeping Giants has called on the two companies to ban Speak from their app stores in response to messages calling for violence against elected officials.
As evidence, the group posted screenshots of messages from Speak calling on Vice President Mike Pence to face a firing squad and urging “American Patriots” to return to the capital on January 19 “wearing our weapons ”.
The group stresses that Google and Apple have clear rules against violent threats and content moderation. Apple’s App Store says apps should have “a method to filter objectionable content from the post” and “a mechanism to report offensive content.” The Google Play Store prohibits apps that “describe or facilitate gratuitous violence or other dangerous activities” and that “we do not allow apps that contain or facilitate threats, harassment or intimidation.”
Neither Apple nor Google responded to requests for comment from The edge. Parler also did not respond to a request for comment.
Speak has seen its numbers skyrocket after Twitter and Facebook tightened their moderation, with conservative protesters finding a place among like-minded users. In an interview Thursday with Kara Swisher on the Rocking podcast, Parler CEO John Matze said all posts on the site that Wednesday’s riots were “organized illegally and against the law” would have been removed. “But I don’t feel responsible for any of this and neither does the platform, given that we are a neutral town square that just adheres to the law,” he said.
The “Stop the Steal” campaign challenging the loss of President Trump gained particular momentum among users of Speak, as well as other election conspiracy theories that had been debunked elsewhere. In the aftermath of the Capitol raid, researchers circulated dozens of posts on Talking that encouraged violence leading to the attack on the Capitol. “Chloroform. Quiet. Sharpen the knives and keep on walking,” one reads, “take ties with you, sneak up on them like ninjas and tie their hands and feet,” one reads in another, to which someone replied, “Around their necks I can’t get it in time, they die.”
On Thursday evening, the site had messages from Trump supporters wondering if his concession speech was a deepfake.
There is precedent for removing an app for hosting violent content. After a gunman killed eleven people in a Pittsburgh synagogue in 2018, PayPal banned social network Gab from its platform, when it was revealed that suspect Robert Bowers had posted anti-Semitic rants on Gab before. shooting. Apple had rejected Gab’s request to appear in its App Store in 2016, and Twitter had removed Gab’s access to its API. Google removed the app from the Google Play Store in 2017 for violating its hate speech policy.
Since Apple and Google control the largest smartphone operating systems, companies wield immense power over the distribution of mobile applications. The inability to push her app to the two largest app stores dramatically reduced Gab’s reach, forcing users to find workarounds for using it on mobile sites. Gab’s desktop site, however, appears to be alive and well, with a new post from President Trump touting the “great American patriots who voted for me” leading the site’s “hot” posts on Friday morning.
Twitter and Facebook have put in place temporary bans on President Trump’s accounts, seeing recent statements as likely to provoke violence. The platforms had previously adopted strict policies against electoral and election disinformation during the campaign.
In an article published Thursday by Speak, Matze criticized Facebook and Twitter for their actions against the president’s messages. “It’s clear that Facebook and Twitter believe the end justifies the means. They believe the American people are weak. They insult our founding fathers by suggesting Zuckerburg [sic] and Dorsey knows what’s best for us, ”he wrote. “Speaking is not an arbiter of truth. We believe in you. We believe that you are wise enough to decide for yourself and that we are convinced that by having access to all the information, we can govern ourselves. “
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