Twitter closes 6 thousand Saudi accounts after acting in favour of government

Representatives of Twitter have said that the removed accounts contained extremely favourable messages in favour of the Saudi government and aimed primarily at a “preference thanks to an aggressive approach, redeal of the message, and response”.

Most of the posts were published in Arabic. According to Twitter, the posts also gave a boost to discussions on sanctions against Iran, as well as the releases of Saudi government officials in Western media.

Recent campaigns on state-backed social media come as technology companies have stepped up efforts to address the issue of false information on their platforms ahead of the US presidential elections held next year.

The efforts follow the findings that Russians have supported financially with thousands of false political ads during the 2016 elections with the aim of sowing disagreements among Americans.

The Twitter announcement highlights the fact that concerns about false information are not limited to the US and Russia.

“Governments have begun campaigning impact the same way that commercial companies launch campaigns to sell powder or cars”, says James Ludes, an expert on national protection.

He says Russian efforts in 2016 showed that it was extremely possible to change the public's attitudes through the intentional use of social media”.

While efforts to eradicate these kinds of campaigns may seem like a game to conceal the real spread of the problem, Mr. Ludes says companies are proving progress in undertaking steps to identify and eradicate foreign-powered manipulation campaigns.