Facebook takes down accounts based in Iran and Russia

Facebook announced on Wednesday that it's removing accounts based in Iran that targeted users in the United States.

In the official statement posted by Nathaniel Gleicher on Wednesday, Facebook's head of security policy, the company outlined the "three unconnected networks of accounts, Pages and Groups" they removed for violating the platform's policy for "coordinated inauthentic behavior on behalf of a government or foreign actor" across both Facebook and Instagram.

• Removed six Facebook accounts and five Instagram accounts as part of an operation out of Iran that focused mainly on the U.S.

• Removed 78 Facebook accounts, 11 Pages, 29 Groups, and four Instagram accounts as part of an operation out of Russia that primarily targeted Ukraine and its neighboring countries

• Removed 13 Facebook accounts and 10 Pages as part of an operation out of Myanmar and Vietnam that targeted audiences in Myanmar

To be honest, none of these are surprising. The flagging of an Iran operation makes total sense given the escalating tensions between that country and the U.S. prompted by the assassination of Iranian general Qassim Suleimani in early January.

One of the posts by Iranian-based bad actors flagged by Facebook Credit: Screenshot / Facebook

It's also worth noting that this sort of action by Iran has been going on for years, pre-dating the recent exchange of missile strikes. Microsoft has been battling Iran-based hackers for at least a year and felt strongly enough about it to warn the public about it last fall.

Meanwhile, the Russian-Ukraine disinformation campaign, the largest of the three outlined in this new report, has been ongoing — yet another game of whack-a-mole Facebook has been playing with Russia since the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

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A post from Russian actors aimed at Ukraine in a campaign of disinformation Credit: Screenshot / Facebook

The same goes for Myanmar, where Facebook and its platforms have been leveraged "by bad actors to spread anti-Muslim, anti-Rohingya, and anti-activist sentiment," according to a 2018 report from the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on Myanmar.

A Myanmar-related post run by several accounts aimed at disinformation Credit: Screenshot / Facebook

While the Iran take-down might garner the most attention because of recent events, it was the smallest of the active groups. In his post, Gleicher notes that "about 60 people followed one or more of these Instagram accounts."

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As for the Russian take-down, Gleicher writes, "500 accounts followed one or more of these Pages, about 6,150 accounts joined at least one of these Groups and around 100 people followed one or more of these Instagram accounts."

The Myanmar operation seems to be the biggest of all three. At least one of the Pages taken down had around 265,000 followers and Facebook accounted for approximately "$1,155,000 in spending for ads on Facebook paid for in US dollars and Vietnamese dong."

With another presidential election race already well underway, get ready for even more of these types of reports.