Republicans step up, daily protests censorship and Twitter boss finds communication from his own platform “Unacceptable” : the controversy surrounding a controversial article on Joe Biden underlines the difficult position of Facebook and Twitter three weeks before the US presidential election.
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On Wednesday, October 14, the conservative New York Post published e-mails allegedly illegally retrieved from a computer containing messages, photos and personal videos of Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden. According to Republicans, Joe Biden would have helped the Ukrainian gas group Burisma, where his son served on the board of directors, to escape corruption investigations.
Twitter and Facebook explain each other
“Our communication on our actions concerning the article of “New York Post” was not great. And block the sharing of the article’s internet address, with zero context explaining why, unacceptable “, said Jack Dorsey, founder of Twitter, Wednesday evening October 14.
Our communication around our actions on the @nypost article was not great. And blocking URL sharing via tweet or DM… https://t.co/RhVNI4bgjz
Twitter had blocked sharing of the article because it contained material that violated two of its rules: not posting personal data (emails, phone numbers) and not posting pirated material.
We want to provide much needed clarity around the actions we’ve taken with respect to two NY Post articles that wer… https://t.co/oo8FfEyWYy
“We do not want to encourage piracy by allowing the dissemination of illegally obtained documents”, had explained the company through its account dedicated to security, recalling that discussing the article was not prohibited, only sharing it.
For his part, one of Facebook executives, Andy Stone, questioned the veracity of the emails and announced that the daily’s information was going to be verified. Pending the results, the Californian group has decided to reduce the visibility of the article.
While I will intentionally not link to the New York Post, I want be clear that this story is eligible to be fact ch… https://t.co/z2GgaaUUMl
These clarifications, however, came after a day of fiery criticism of the networks.
“They’re trying to protect Biden”
“Awful that Twitter and Facebook removed the email post […] related to the sleeping Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, in the “New York Post” », indignant Donald Trump on his favorite network.
So terrible that Facebook and Twitter took down the story of “Smoking Gun” emails related to Sleepy Joe Biden and h… https://t.co/qEV2S1BZwC
The Republican billionaire later accused the tweet platform of blocking the account of his spokesperson, Kayleigh McEnany, for sharing the article.
“Because she shared the truth! They closed his account “, “They’re trying to protect Biden”, proclaimed the American president, during a rally in Iowa.
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Republican Senator Josh Hawley denounced the “Bias” Facebook and a block “It seems selective” of an article on “A potentially unethical act of a presidential candidate”. In a tweet, he expressed his desire to have the two social networks auditioned under oath before the committee he chairs in the Senate.
.@Twitter @jack this is not nearly good enough. In fact, it’s a joke. It’s downright insulting. I will ask you – an… https://t.co/Yoj4GDvffJ
The “New York Post”, one of the most widely read dailies in the country, for its part denounced the “Facebook censorship to help Joe Biden’s campaign”.
Moderation of content to avoid interference
“Censor first, ask questions later: this is a scandalous attitude for one of the most powerful platforms in the United States”, continues an editorial in the newspaper, accusing Facebook of having become “A propaganda machine”.
Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg has repeatedly said that networks should not be “Arbiters of truth”, in particular to justify its choice to limit the remarks of political figures very little, supposed to allow users to form their own opinion.
Trump pinned for disinformation by Facebook and Twitter
But the platforms are accused of censorship by the conservatives, and are criticized, on the left, for not sufficiently tackling false information, incitement to hatred and attempts to discourage voters from voting, among others. After months of growing tensions, and a pandemic conducive to disinformation, they have largely tightened their rules on moderation of content, to protect the elections from interference and manipulation.
However, the “New York Post” article recalls the case concerning Hillary Clinton, the Democratic candidate in 2016, whose e-mails hacked by Russian hackers had been disseminated on the internet by anonymous sites and by WikiLeaks. Facebook and Twitter have promised to be tough on these hack-and-leak tactics, where entities give hacked information to the media and use networks to spread it.
The return of the “Ukrainian affair”
The New York Post claims to have obtained a copy of the hard drive of a laptop computer left for repair by Hunter Biden at a store in Delaware in April 2019. The copy is believed to have arrived in the hands of personal attorney for Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, who would then have provided it to the newspaper.
Understand the “Ukrainian affair” which turns against Trump in 6 questions
The article and documents point in the direction of the accusations of Donald Trump and his supporters. According to them, Joe Biden, then vice-president of Barack Obama, had Ukrainian attorney general Viktor Chokine sacked in 2016 to help Burisma escape anti-corruption investigations that would have splashed his son.
Without denying the existence of the computer or the messages, a spokesperson for Joe Biden, Andrew Bates, accused Rudy Giuliani of having already spread “Discredited conspiracy theories”. Burisma was at the center of the landmark impeachment trial against Donald Trump, accused of pressuring Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden and Hunter’s business activities. The US president was acquitted in February.
