Germany – The Facebook group Meta and the short message service Twitter are reacting to the Russian war of aggression against Ukraine with restrictions on their social networks. The security chief at Facebook, Nathaniel Gleicher, announced on Twitter on Saturday that Russian state media are being prevented from placing ads on the social network worldwide or making money there. Twitter, in turn, is blocking ads in Russia and Ukraine until further notice. This is to ensure that important public safety information is highlighted. Advertising distracts from that.
Meanwhile, Ukraine’s Digitization Minister, Deputy Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov, wrote to Apple CEO Tim Cook, calling on him to support sanctions against Russia by blocking Apple services, including the app store. The letter, which was circulated on Twitter, said: “We need your support – in 2022 modern technology may be the best answer to the tanks, multiple rocket launchers (Grad) and missiles”. He concluded by saying: “We are sure that such actions will motivate the youth and active population of Russia to proactively stop the shameful military aggression.”
In response to the conflict in Ukraine, a special operations center with experts was set up in order to be able to react as quickly as possible, explained Facebook security chief Gleicher. “We are closely monitoring the situation in Ukraine and will continue to share our steps to protect people on our platform.” Russia had partially restricted Facebook the day before. The communications supervisor Roskomnadzor in Moscow had accused the Facebook group of having violated “fundamental human rights and freedoms” and “rights and freedoms of Russian citizens” by blocking Russian media on the network.
Meanwhile, the German Funke media group registered Internet attacks on its websites. The live blog of the group’s “Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung” (WAZ), which contains news about the Russian attack on Ukraine, said on Friday evening: “The websites of the daily newspapers, magazines and reach portals of the Funke media group have been Attacked in several waves tomorrow by so-called bots.” A bot is automated software designed to cause harm.
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