Meta, the company that owns the social media platforms Facebook, Instagram and Threads and the messaging service WhatsApp, has announced that it has banned the state broadcaster RT and other Russian media outlets, accused of conducting covert operations to influence users through deceptive methods and attempting to evade controls, provoking the ire of the Kremlin.
“After careful consideration, we have expanded our controls over Russian state media,” the company said in a statement yesterday.Russia September, RT and other related entities are now banned from our apps globally for foreign interference activities.”
Before the tender, the only broadcaster RT had 7.2 million followers on Facebook and 1 million followers on Instagram. But the measure also concerns other Russian newspapers: the Rossiya Segodnya group in fact manages various channels including Sputnik and the official Russian news agency RIA NewsAccording to the US company, the groups involved “used deceptive tactics to conduct covert influence operations online”.
For its part, the Kremlin said that Meta was “discrediting itself” by banning these outlets from its platforms. “Such selective actions against Russian media are unacceptable,” it said. declared Russian government spokesman Dmitry Peskov spoke at a press conference today. “This, of course, complicates the prospect of normalizing our relations with Meta,” whose activities are banned in the Russian Federation, which has included the American company in the list of “extremist” groups.
Meta’s decision comes about ten days after the announcement by the U.S. Department of Justice that two employees of RT for funneling nearly $10 million into a U.S. company, identified from the broadcaster CNN such as Tenet Media, “to create and amplify content aligned with Russian interests.” This covert influence campaign, law in a statement from the Washington department, was addressed to the American public in view of the 2024 US presidential elections. Last week, however, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken had accused the leadership of RT of promoting an online crowdfunding initiative to provide military equipment to Russian soldiers in Ukraine.
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