As the fake accounts spreading misinformation growing on its platform, Twitter said it banned over 100 accounts that pushed the #IStandWithPutin trend aggressively in the last few days.
These accounts are said to have a few dozen followers at the time of the ban, and stock images as profile photos. The pro-Russain content they were spreading on Twitter was said to be against the platform’s spam policy.
Banning Pro-Russain Twitter Accounts
Even before the war between Ukraine and Russia began, Russian troll farms have started spreading pro-Russain content on various social media platforms. Since January this year, there are posts coming from various suspicious accounts sharing articles on Russia’s right to Ukraine.
And when the war broke out, social media platforms started wiping out all such posts from past and current, with new tools and dedicated teams. Meta earlier said it banned several accounts on Facebook and Instagram, which are posting misinformation about the Ukrainian war situation.
The accounts spreading questionable content posed as Ukrainian journalists and military people, who were banned later. And now, Twitter follows the suit by banning over 100 accounts on its platform, which the company said were involved in a “coordinated inauthentic behavior.”
All these accounts are said to be pushing unreliable content with the #IStandWithPutin hashtag, a even trended it on Twitter amid the invasion in Ukraine. A Twitter spokesperson later said that they’re investigating the origins and links between those accounts, and reasoned the ban for violating “platform manipulation and spam policy.”
All those accounts were said to have a few dozen followers and stock photos as their profile pictures. This triggered suspicion among Twitter’s team of disinformation researchers, who learned more about them and pulled them offline before going viral.
And as the war continues to happen, we may see more of such misinformation flowing into public channels through numerous such accounts.
