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Plot theorist Alex Jones speaks at the Capitol Hill Dirksen Building on September 5th. (Jose Luis Magana / AP)
Brian Fung
Journalist specializing in telecommunications, media, cryptocurrency and competition
PayPal ends its relationship with Alex Jones and his website, Infowars, said Friday the online payment service.
After a thorough review of Infowars and its associated sites, PayPal said in a statement that the company "had discovered cases of promoting hatred or discriminatory intolerance against certain communities and religions, which goes against our value of inclusion.
PayPal on Thursday notified Infowars' decision, prompting the site to accuse PayPal in a blog post about a "political ploy aimed at sabotaging an influential media financially." PayPal's services will not work anymore.
PayPal declined to cite specific examples of the problematic behavior of Infowars. But Infowars has attracted more and more attention – and criticism – for its role in spreading theories of online conspiracy and misinformation. The decision of PayPal on Friday makes it the latest technology company to ban Jones and its platform content, like Apple, Facebook and Google, among others.
Last month, Jones' podcasts were removed from iTunes after Apple said it did not tolerate hate speech. YouTube quickly took similar action against Infowars, claiming that Jones had "repeatedly" violated his terms of service. Although Twitter initially resisted Jones' ban, he also removed it from his platform earlier this month with a permanent suspension.
Twitter's decision came hours after Jones appeared at a high-level congressional hearing involving Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey and Facebook operations director Sheryl Sandberg. During the event, Jones was accused of heckling journalists and Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Subsequently, Jones attempted to confront Dorsey as he was coming out of the Senate office building where the hearing had taken place.
PayPal's decision to remove Jones hits him where he is likely to hurt his business the most: his wallet.
A study conducted by Columbia University's Tow Center for Digital Journalism found that Jones had managed to make one of the e-commerce recipes. Revenues could dry up without an online payment processor.
Last month, about 1.15 million visitors accessed Jones' online storefront, Infowarsstore.com, Jonathan Albright, director of research at Tow Center, told Craig Timberg in a recent interview. Of these, over 60% went through PayPal after visiting their digital store, which implies that Jones is efficient at converting visitors into paying customers.
Having learned about the imminent ban, Infowars supporters began to urge the site accept cryptocurrency such as bitcoin.
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