Facebook declared hundreds of Ukrainian pages fake and deleted them
Facebook has removed 244 accounts, 269 pages, 80 groups and two events in Iraq and Ukraine from its social network due to “inauthentic activities.” For the same reason, seven accounts were deleted from the Facebook-owned social network Instagram.
This is stated in a statement by the head of the company's cybersecurity department, Nathaniel Gleicher.
“Today we removed certain pages, groups and accounts involved in coordinated inauthentic activity on Facebook and Instagram. We found isolated cases of such behavior in Iraq and Ukraine. No connection was identified between them, but both were aimed at misleading people about who they belong to and what they do,” it says.
The company notes that fictitious accounts in Iraq, some of which were likely purchased, were used to spread information about local political and social issues. The published posts talked, in particular, about the actions of American troops in the country, tense relations with Iran, religion and former leader Saddam Hussein.
Ukrainian fictitious accounts and groups posted news about celebrities, sports and politics, and also criticized public figures.
The management of the social network emphasized that the accounts were blocked in connection with their actions, and not with the content they published.
In July of this year, Facebook has already deleted hundreds of accounts from Ukraine, Russia, Thailand and Honduras due to fakes.
If you find an error, please select a piece of text and press Ctrl + Enter.
Thank you!
Now the editors are aware.