Facebook Removed More Than 100 Pages Linked to Pakistani Army

Facebook has removed nearly 103 pages, groups and accounts from its network, which were a link to Pakistan’s Military Public Relations arm. Facebook said it has removed the pages on Facebook and Instagram that were regularly used to spread information about the Indian government, Pakistani Politics, Political Leaders and Pakistani Military.

 

Facebook has removed 24 pages, 57 accounts and 7 groups from its platform, which had more than 2.8 million followers. Apart from this, an additional 15 Instagram accounts were also removed.

 

Facebook’s head of the Cyber Security, Nathaniel Gleicher said in a statement, “Today we removed 103 pages, Groups and accounts for engaging in coordinated inauthentic behaviour on Facebook and Instagram as part of a network that originated in Pakistan. Although the people behind this activity attempted to conceal their identities, our investigation found that it was linked to employees of the ISPR (Inter-Service Public Relations) of the Pakistani military”.

 

Though, so far there was no counter comment from the Pakistani Military’s ISPR (Inter-Service Public Relations).

 

The announcement from Facebook has come at a time when it is facing increasing pressure from across the world, over the use of its platforms by politically motivated groups, many of which do not reveal their true identity.

 

Before the removal of the pages, an analysis of the pages, accounts, and groups is done by the digital forensic lab of Atlantic Council think tank and found that the activities and posts of the pages are strongly under question, as they strongly supported Pakistan and regularly attacked India, which is a consistent behaviour of ISPR.

 

The Pakistan Military media spokesmen in the past have often used a popular term ‘fifth generation warfare’ during several press conferences, which is referred to an unconventional battlefield, which includes the dissemination of information and countering other information on social media.

 

In the past two years, a number of journalists and activists who are critical of the military on social media have been threatened and abducted. In 2017, three persons were abducted for five weeks. They were associated with news outlets and it was found that they had been taken by the military’s spy wing.

 

Digital Right Group activist, Shahzad Ahmad told Reuters, “Winning the war of narratives and making the dissenting voices irrelevant in cyberspace is possibly their main aim. They are organized, well-resourced groups with a sense of purpose, we call them cyber armies”.

 

Only a week ago, Facebook has removed a social media network in the Philippines that was linked to a businessman who has claimed to have managed the President’s online election campaign in 2016. Facebook has also taken similar steps against such fictitious accounts in Russia and Iran.