Facebook deletes 652 fake accounts and pages targeting world politics

Facebook deletes 652 fake accounts and pages targeting world politics According to Facebook, some of the fake Pages, groups and accounts originated in Iran and some in Russia

International News : Facebook has removed 652 fake accounts for “coordinated inauthentic behaviour” that originated in Iran and Russia and targeted people across multiple Internet services in the Middle East, Latin America, Britain and the US. According to Facebook, some of the fake Pages, groups and accounts originated in Iran and some in Russia.

“We’re still investigating, and we have shared what we know with the US and UK governments. Since there are US sanctions involving Iran, we’ve also briefed the US Treasury and State Departments,” Nathaniel Gleicher, Head of Cybersecurity Policy at Facebook, said in a statement on Tuesday.

These sanctions allow companies to provide people Internet services for personal communications, including the government and its affiliates.

“But Facebook takes steps to prevent people in Iran and other sanctioned

countries from using our ad tools,” said Gleicher.

Facebook also removed Pages, groups and accounts that can be linked to sources the US government has previously identified as Russian military intelligence services.

“While these are some of the same bad actors we removed for cybersecurity

attacks before the 2016 US election, this more recent activity focused on politics in Syria and Ukraine,” Facebook said.

For example, these accounts are associated with Inside Syria Media Centre, which the Atlantic Council and other organisations have identified for covertly spreading pro-Russian and pro-Assad content.

“We’re working closely with US law enforcement on this investigation, and

we appreciate their help. These investigations are ongoing – and given the sensitivity, we aren’t sharing more information about what we removed,” Facebook added.

Facebook acted on these accounts after FireEye, a global cybersecurity firm, gave it information in July about “Liberty Front Press”, a network of Facebook Pages as well as accounts on other online services…Read More