A network of profit-driven pages fuelling anti-Islamic sentiment was exposed two months ago but is still operating. Facebook has failed to stop a coordinated far-right operation profiting from disinformation and anti-Islamic hate almost two months after it was publicly exposed. The Guardian revealed in December that a network of Facebook’s largest far-right pages were part of a coordinated commercial enterprise that for years had been harvesting Islamophobic hate for profit, prompting promises from the social media giant that it would crack down on the network. Facebook soon removed several pages and accounts which it said “appeared to be financially motivated” and said it had updated its inauthentic behaviour policy to “further improve our ability to counter new tactics”. Facebook soon removed several pages and accounts which it said “appeared to be financially motivated” and said it had updated its inauthentic behaviour policy to “further improve our ability to counter new tactics”. “These pages and accounts violated our policy against spam and fake accounts by posting clickbait content to drive people to off-platform sites,” a Facebook spokesperson said at the time. “Our investigations are continuing and, as always, we’ll take action if we find any violations.” But two months after Facebook was made aware of the scheme, an analysis by the Guardian has confirmed that a number of the pages are still feeding off anti-Islamic content to drive readers to the same for-profit, third-party websites.
via guardian: Far-right ‘hate factory’ still active on Facebook despite pledge to stop it