(THREAD) These private Facebook groups that concentrate on anti-mask discussion about schools really are something else. They all appear to ignore the fact that both adults and children are being hospitalized and are suffering. Facebook employees make these groups possible.
1/ Group member claiming to be a parent says they moved from New York to Tennessee to escape "tyranny." Once they arrived, Tennessee had implemented measures to keep people safe, which apparently clashed with this person's views.
2/ A group member asks "when is your 'enough is enough'"?
3/ I'm seeing countless mentions of people comparing unmasked kids having to sit in a different place to
"segregation," as they compare not wanting to keep children and school staff safe to the segregation of Black people from decades ago.
4/ Another example of a person claiming to be a parent mentioning "segregation."
5/ Just a brief thread. This kind of stuff is happening in private Facebook groups in multiple states. Facebook allows it.
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(THREAD) YouTube has removed multiple verified channels named “Fox News” and “Fox News Alert” following an Oct. 1 Snopes investigation that found they were pumping out disinformation to millions of subscribers. These channels were not managed by Fox News. snopes.com/news/2021/10/0…
1/ All of the YouTube channels posted long video clips from Fox News Channel. However, the thumbnails were altered to make it look like U.S. President Joe Biden was either dying or going to jail and that former U.S. President Donald Trump was coming back. snopes.com/news/2021/10/0…
2/ This was similar to a debunked QAnon conspiracy theory that led to federal authorities worrying of potential violence from Trump supporters when such disinformation inevitably failed to come true.
(THREAD) Ahead of the #60Minutes interview with the Facebook whistleblower, know this:
We contacted Facebook multiple times ahead of Jan. 6 to warn about violent rhetoric in a group with members that planned on taking matters into their own hands. snopes.com/news/2021/02/1…
1/ Facebook did not respond to us, despite multiple attempts to reach the company for comment.
We contacted the company warning them of the violent rhetoric and organizing that we saw, and we sent our emails in the days both before and after Nov. 3, which was Election Day.
2/ The New York Times later reported that a man named Keith Lee “spent the morning of Jan. 6 casing the entrances to the Capitol.” During the riots, he carried a bullhorn. “Mr. Lee called out for the mob to rush in, until his voice echoed from the dome of the Rotunda.”
The mistake made by the likely Russian account, an admin in a Pennsylvania for Trump Facebook Group, was that it appeared to have accidentally liked the page Молекулярная диагностика 2020. This was the only Russian page out of hundreds of page likes.
Forgot to switch accounts?
Молекулярная диагностика 2020 (Molecular Diagnostics) is a Moscow conference: "The leading event in the field of molecular diagnostics and related science and medicine trends in Russia."
It is supported by The Ministry of Health of the Russian Federation. bit.ly/31Kegna
1/ NEW from me via @snopes. A likely Russian admin was active in a Pennsylvania for Trump Facebook Group since before the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and just disappeared this month after we contacted FB with questions. bit.ly/31Kegna#Election2020
2/ The Facebook admin account's activity paralleled descriptions of fake personas mentioned in the Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee's report on Russia's efforts.
Following Trump's 2016 victory, the account defended Russia from accusations of foreign interference.
3/ The admin account was named "Gina Grin." The account (and what appeared to be a backup account) had around 2,000 total profile followers, while the Facebook Group now has 115,000 members.
Here's what we know about the inauthenticity of these accounts.
2/ All 3 Facebook groups appeared to engage in coordinated inauthentic behavior, whether with fake accounts in admin slots, or with duplicate accounts with the same person having several accounts that were all admins.
3/ The largest of the three Facebook groups that Snopes reporters noticed had been removed was Trump Train 2020, Red Wave, which amassed nearly 1.1 million members in just over three months. It was created in June.
That means an average growth of 366,000 members per month.
2/ Right now, 3 of the accounts that managed the group are still available on Facebook. One of them is named Elisabeth Kim, but features a profile photo of a woman with a name tag that says "Marti Jordan."
Kayleigh McEnany OFFICIAL was removed just weeks ahead of the election.
3/ Snopes also found these pages that were managed from Macedonia: