X purges 13,000 accounts ahead of US midterms
X purges 13,000 accounts linked to suspected meddling ahead of US midterms
X says it has removed over 13,000 accounts tied to three suspected foreign influence operations targeting US political debate. The platform attributed the networks to Iran, Russia, and China, but provided no public evidence. The takedowns come before the November 3 midterm elections, and X also pointed to its Civic Integrity policy and Community Notes system.
X did not publicly explain the evidence behind its attribution.
- stetrain
I'm sure this was done in a perfectly fair and balanced manner and not in a way that is at all aligned to the CEO's publicly stated politics.
- mingus88
What a blow to Elon to lose his account in his own platform
- xphos
I am fine with content policeing actions from being legal but I think we content enforcement of this nature on platforms that live on freedom of press and speech should be forced to publicize when that take action against accounts. Publicize the lists for bans, and reason for it. Here the reason is given but its not account linked so its hard to say if the reason is justifed with the accounts histories.
Maybe the government needs a meta organization that upholds freedom of speech enforcement from platforms and companies that get broad Section 230 protections. I.e Facebook, X, Twitch, Youtube, etc. If a company can just purge you soruce of speech entirely the country protections seem lacking for the public welfare. Curious what other people think. I know an agency like this is rife to partisan infiltration but if its roll is to for unbanning rather than banning I think the scope of its potential abuse would be extremely narrow.
- voidhorse
Meanwhile: https://apnews.com/article/elon-musk-midterms-republicans-do...
Manipulation of elections is OK as long as you do it with money.
- bratsche
Probably 13,000 accounts that suddenly went dark after Ukraine took out some datacenter in Russia recently.