It took 15 days for Facebook to remove 88 pro-Trump ads sporting a Nazi symbol from its platform. On Thursday evening, the social network announced that it had unpublished these campaign announcements for the re-election of Donald Trump in November, decked out in a red triangle, symbol of the political prisoners sent to the Nazi concentration camps. Spotted by the NGO Media Matters, they appeared since June 3. "We removed these posts and ads because they violate our rules on organized hatred , " a spokesman for the social media giant said Thursday.
Screenshot of ad removed by Facebook. HANDOUT / AFP
"Dangerous hordes of the far left crisscross our streets to create chaos ," we could read in this advertisement. Sign up IMMEDIATELY to support our President Trump and his decision to list the Antifas as a terrorist group. ” Under this message was a large red triangle strangely copying the Nazi symbol attached to political prisoners. "Our rules of use prohibit the use of a symbol used by a prohibited hate group designating political prisoners, without the necessary context to condemn or comment on this symbol," said a Facebook spokesperson.
A great classic of fascist disinformation
Yann Le Cun, AI manager at Facebook."Note that the advertisement was not removed because it was a lie, even if it is: Antifa is an entity that was created from scratch by Trump to scare his base and rally him , commented Facebook's head of artificial intelligence research, Yann Le Cun, on his Facebook page. A great classic of fascist disinformation. ”
The platform, however, took a long time to react, causing a new wave of indignation across the Atlantic. "Despite the violation of Facebook rules, the advertisement had first been approved ," notes Media Matters President Angelo Carusone. This is a new example that the social network cannot even enforce the minimum standards that it has itself set. Either because he is incapable of it, or because he is in cahoots. Whatever the reason, it's alarming. ” The red triangle is, however, used in antifas iconography, defended the Trump campaign team. But very rarely, say analysts.
"It's up to people to decide"
Facebook has long been accused of not doing enough against the political advertisements, sometimes false, that flourish on its platform. In recent weeks he has been widely criticized, including internally, for having done nothing about a post by Donald Trump threatening the Black Lives Matter protesters. "When the looting begins, the shooting begins," he wrote on Twitter and Facebook.
Under pressure, the founder and boss of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, announced Wednesday that the social network would now offer its users to be able to hide political ads on their pages. An option which will be generalized to the whole world by September. But there is no question of purely and simply removing political advertisements. "In a democracy, I think it's up to people to decide what's credible, not tech companies," he said in the past.
Mark Zuckerberg's pro-freedom of speech decision was deemed minimalist. Other social networks, such as Twitter, decided in late 2019 to no longer allow political advertising. "We think that the reach of a political message must be earned," explained Jack Dorsey, the co-founder and CEO of the network.
Facebook is also not completely inactive and is betting on transparency. "We continue to feed an open library of political ads, a tracker to quickly see how much and where US presidential candidates in November are spending their advertising dollars," a Facebook official said at a press conference on Wednesday. We also have a whole authorization process for political ads to verify who the advertisers are and where they are based in the United States. ” It is also a way of fighting against attempts at foreign influence.
For social networks, which are financed by advertising, political propaganda represents a very important market, especially during the electoral years.