Several Facebook, Twitter accounts removed ahead of US midterm elections

Campaigns for the midterm elections in the United States are in full swing on social media sites, however, to curb those discouraging others from voting, Facebook and Twitter has blocked various accounts.

In a blog post published yesterday, Facebook’s Head of Cybersecurity Policy, Nathaniel Gleicher, said that after being notified by the US law enforcement; the firm has discovered around 115 fake and suspicious accounts.

Till now, Facebook identified around 30 Facebook accounts and 85 Instagram accounts that might be engaged in ‘coordinated inauthentic behavior’ and ‘linked to foreign entities’. The accounts have now been blocked just ahead of US midterm elections to be held today, November 6.

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The social media firm added that all the Facebook Pages associated with these accounts appear to be the French or Russian language, whereas the Instagram accounts seemed to have been in English, some related to celebrities, while other linked to political debate.

“Typically, we would be further along with our analysis before announcing anything publicly. But given that we are only one day away from important elections in the US, we wanted to let people know about the action we’ve taken and the facts as we know them today,” read the blog post.

Facebook is not the only one taking steps for cybersecurity, as Twitter too removed few accounts ahead of the midterms. Last week, Twitter announced that it has deleted over 10,000 automated accounts that discourage people from voting, wrote News8.