Social media giant Facebook recently announced that it would ban all accounts related to the QAnon theory across both its main platform and Instagram.
NBC News reports that tech giant Facebook has announced plans to ban all QAnon accounts from its platforms following an update to the policy it created in August which initially only removed accounts related to the QAnon theory that specifically discussed violence.
The initial policy resulted in the deletion of around 1,500 pages, groups, and profiles. A Facebook spokesperson stated that the enforcement of the new policy, which took effect on Tuesday, will “bring to parity what we’ve been doing on other pieces of policy with regard to militarized social movements,” referring to militia and terrorist groups that regularly call for violence.
Facebook wrote in a press release:
Starting today, we will remove Facebook Pages, Groups and Instagram accounts for representing QAnon. We’re starting to enforce this updated policy today and are removing content accordingly, but this work will take time and will continue in the coming days and weeks.
Our Dangerous Organizations Operations team will continue to enforce this policy and proactively detect content for removal instead of relying on user reports.
The Facebook spokesperson told NBC that the company believed it needed to limit the “ability of QAnon and Militarized Social Movements to operate and organize on our platform.” The spokesperson clarified that Facebook is “not going after individual posts,” but rather accounts that regularly spread the QAnon theory.
Facebook is not the only tech giant taking action against QAnon accounts. In July, Twitter banned 7,000 accounts and limited 150,000 others for QAnon posts.
Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or email him at lnolan@breitbart.com
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