Facebook removes 82 fake pages, groups and accounts tied to Iran

Washington: Facebook Inc said on Friday it had deleted accounts originating in Iran that attracted more than 1 million US and British followers, its latest effort to combat disinformation activity on its platform.

Social media companies are struggling to stop attempts by people inside and outside the United States to spread false information on their platforms with goals ranging from destabilising elections by stoking hardline positions to supporting propaganda campaigns.

The fake Facebook accounts originating in Iran mostly targeted American liberals, according to the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab, a think-tank that works with Facebook to study propaganda online.

Facebook said it removed 82 pages, groups and accounts on Facebook and Instagram that represented themselves as being American or British citizens, then posted on “politically charged” topics such as race relations, opposition to US

President Donald Trump and immigration, Facebook’s head of cybersecurity policy, Nathaniel Gleicher, said in a blog post.

In total, the removed accounts attracted more than 1 million followers. The Iran-linked posts were amplified through less than $100 in advertising on Facebook and Instagram, Facebook said.

While the accounts originated in Iran, it was unclear if they were linked to the Tehran government, according to Facebook, which shared the information with researchers, other technology companies and the British and US governments.

The Iranian UN mission did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The action follows takedowns in August by Facebook, Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc of hundreds of accounts linked to Iranian propaganda.

The latest operation was more sophisticated in some instances, making it difficult to identify, Gleicher said during a press conference phone call on Friday.

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Rally To Support Iran Resistance

On June 30, Iranians from across the world, including the Iranian-American community of New Mexico, will be gathering near Paris to lend our voice to the cause of democracy in our homeland as part of the annual Iran Freedom rally. The event typically attracts a crowd of approximately 100,000 participants, including hundreds of dignitaries from North America, Europe and much of the world. But given everything happening inside and outside of Iran, this year might be a watershed.

Iran resistance

The rally is a unique showcase for the platform of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), which is at the heart of global activism pushing to bring democracy to the people of Iran. Its vision for the country’s democratic future is outlined by the 10-point plan created by its president elect, Maryam Rajavi. It calls for free and fair elections, legal protections for ethnic and religious minorities as well as women, and the dissolution of the current regime’s nuclear weapons program.

NCRI’s platform makes it a natural ally to the United States and Europe, and an important alternative to theocratic system that currently reigns in Iran and reinforces the nation’s status as the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism and the country with the highest rate of executions per capita.

That same system also makes the existing Iranian government fundamentally unconcerned with the interests of its own people. And this, of course, makes the regime vulnerable to domestic discontent. Indeed, that discontent reached a fever pitch at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, when the Islamic Republic was rocked by a nationwide uprising, during which protesters in approximately 140 cities rejected both the “hardline” and “reformist” political factions and chanted “death to the dictator” and “death to Rouhani,” in reference to the supreme leader and the president of the regime, respectively.

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Iran's cyber warfare against its people must not stand

New cyber revelations from the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran (MEK), the Iranian opposition movement, about the scope of mass surveillance by the Iranian regime are significant. Why? They show the desperation of the Iranian regime in confronting the uprising that began nationwide last December and has continued to this day.  

Anti-government protesters  chanted slogans indicative of a revolution: “Death to the dictator,” “Death to (Supreme Leader) Khamenei”, “Death to (Hassan) Rouhani,” “Don’t be afraid, we are all together,” “Forget about Syria, think about us,” “Not Gaza, nor Lebanon, my life for Iran,” and “Reformer, Hardline, the Game Is Now Over.”

The fact that protests expanded to over 140 cities, by some estimates, constitutes an existential threat to the regime and an opportunity to use the people’s resentment as leverage against it. The Obama administration squandered valuable opportunities in the past — most notably during the 2009 anti-government protests in Iran.

Only when the Iranian regime employed cyber technology was it able to slow down the spread of the protests and wage large numbers of arrests.

Sanctions help, not hurt, Iran’s people

An Iranian man flashes the victory sign as an other holds the Iranian national flag during celebration in northern Tehran on July 14, 2015, after Iran’s nuclear negotiating team struck a deal with world powers in Vienna.

Under the 2015 nuclear agreement, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), the Iranian regime received tens of billions of dollars in sanctions relief, plus the promise of new business from a variety of Western companies. Some people see this as a triumph of diplomacy which will improve the lives of the Iranian people, and engender good will. A common argument against economic sanctions is that that the private sector and a nation’s citizenry should not suffer as a result of the actions of the government.

The problem with this argument as it applies to Iran’s ruling theocracy is that there effectively is no private sector in Iran. In reality, the regime’s “privatization scheme” to create the appearance of a growing private sector primarily entails the transfer of state assets into the hands of a quasi- private sector comprised of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and a variety of its front companies and affiliates.

A closer look confirms that life has not improved for the Iranian people as a result of sanctions relief. They are suffering the same rampant unemployment, and they are still being brutally repressed by hardline institutions including the IRGC. In fact, the Islamic Republic is in the midst of an ever-escalating crackdown on activists, journalists, dual nationals, and anyone deemed to be a threat to the theocratic system.

PHOTO: Pro-Iran Reporter Caught Flipping Off Iranian Dissident Protestors

July 19, 2017 12:32 pm

A well-known pro-Iran advocate who serves as a reporter for Al Monitor, as well as a top expert at the Atlantic Council, a D.C.-based think-tank, has been pictured giving the middle finger to anti-Iran dissident protestors.

Barbara Slavin, an Al Monitor columnist and longtime Atlantic Council member viewed as sympathetic to the Iranian regime, appeared to flip off protestors earlier this week outside of a Council for Foreign Relations event featuring Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, a chief architect of the landmark nuclear agreement.

Slavin was reportedly leaving the Zarif event when she came across a delegation of protestors opposed to Iran’s Islamic hardline regime. Slavin can be seen smiling while she raises two middle fingers in the protestors’ direction.