Social Media Giant Facebook Banned Its Biggest Group ‘QAnon’

Facebook has banned one of the largest conspiracy-theory groups on its platforms, citing repeated policy violations groups.   

The Official Q/QAnon group, which Facebook said it shut down Tuesday, was identified as having violated Facebook policies prohibiting bullying and harassment, hate speech, and misinformation.

“We’ve removed this group for repeatedly posting content that violated our policies,” a Facebook rep said in a statement sent to Variety.

BBC journalist Shayan Sardarizadeh points out that the “Official Q/Qanon” group received more than 10 million engagements across 500,000 posts during the first 7 months of 2020. The group spiked in membership in early March, just as the full force of the coronavirus pandemic began to hit the United States.

According to media reports, on Facebook, Official QAnon had almost 200,000 members before it was kicked off the platform. Other QAnon groups remain active on the social network.

Reuters reported that the move comes after Twitter on July 21 said it banned some 7,000 accounts affiliated with QAnon. In May, Facebook removed a “smaller network” of QAnon-affiliated accounts after they spread misinformation about the coronavirus.

According to the Anti-Defamation League, the pro-Donald Trump movement known as QAnon, which surfaced in 2017 on 4chan, is primarily “an online trolling and disinformation movement” whose followers believe “world governments are being controlled by a shadowy cabal of pedophiles (who will eventually be brought to justice by President Trump).” Facebook appears to be taking more aggressive action against hate groups, amid the #StopHateForProfit ad boycott organized by groups including the ADL and NAACP. In June, Facebook announced a blanket ban on the “boogaloo” far-right anti-government movement. The company said at the time “is the latest step in our commitment to ban people who proclaim a violent mission from using our platform.”