Facebook eliminates hundreds of fake accounts before US mid-term elections – BGR

With less than a month of mid-term US elections before millions of people vote, Facebook has removed hundreds of pages and accounts that spread misinformation. In an article published on Friday, Facebook revealed that it had removed 559 pages and 251 accounts "that consistently violate our spam policies and coordinated unauthorized behavior." The social media giant also provided details on these accounts.

Facebook indicates that offenders often use fake accounts or multiple accounts with the same name to share "huge amounts of content" with different groups and pages, directing users to their websites. This made their content more viral. Small farms disguised as political discussion forums were also part of the purge.

Facebook has not specified any accounts, pages or groups affected by this recent eradication of the broken rules, but The Wall Street Journal reports that some of the affected pages include Right Wing News, The Resistance and Reverb Press (each of them being politically affiliated). Facebook says that it is not the content of these pages that made them go down, but many behavioral violations, detailed above.

"Topics such as natural disasters or celebrity gossip are popular ways to generate clickbait," says Facebook. "But today, these networks are increasingly using sensational political content, regardless of their political orientation, to create an audience and drive traffic to their websites, thus making money for every visitor to the Web. site."

Facebook then touched on the difference between coordination for the strength of the property and coordination that could lead to the removal of your account or page from the site, as well as the difficulties of this process:

Of course, there are legitimate reasons for accounts and Pages to coordinate: this is the foundation of fundraising campaigns and grassroots organizations. But the difference is that these groups first know who they are and what they are doing. As we discover this type of abuse better, its authors, whether motivated by economic or political considerations, will change tactics to avoid detection. That's why we continue to invest heavily, including in improving technology, to prevent this type of abuse. Because people will only share on Facebook that they feel safe and trust the links they establish here.

It remains to be seen if Facebook will be able to have a significant impact on ad farms, fake accounts and pages breaking the rules before November 6, but at least something is being done.

Source of the image: LODI Franck / SIPA / Shutterstock