CYBER CRIME: BANGKOK- MYANMAR- Meta says to ban Myanmar military-backed businesses from all platforms
FILE – This March 29, 2018, file photo shows the Facebook logo on screens at the Nasdaq MarketSite, in New York’s Times Square. Facebooks parent company Meta announced Wednesday, Dec. 8, 2021, that it has expanded its ban on postings linked to Myanmars military to include all pages, groups, and accounts representing military-controlled businesses. It had already banned advertising from such businesses in February. (AP Photo/Richard Drew, File) /
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BANGKOK (AFP) – Facebook parent Meta will ban all pages and accounts belonging to Myanmar military-backed businesses, it said, expanding its restraints on the country’s armed forces.
Myanmar’s secretive military has extensive business interests, with tentacles in industries as diverse as transportation, textiles, tourism and banking. Activists and rights groups said they funded crackdowns and abuses even before the February coup that ousted Aung San Suu Kyi and launched a bloody crackdown on dissent.
In late February Facebook removed all accounts linked to the military, also known as the Tatmadaw, citing the junta’s use of deadly force against anti-coup demonstrators. It also banned military-linked firms from advertising on its platforms.
Meta “will now also remove Pages, Groups and Accounts representing military-controlled businesses”, it said in a statement on Tuesday.
The decision was “based on extensive documentation by the international community of these businesses’ direct role in funding the Tatmadaw’s ongoing violence and human rights abuses in Myanmar”, it said, adding it would use the report from a 2019 United Nations (UN) fact-finding mission into the military’s economic interests “as the basis” for its actions.
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The pages of Myawaddy Trading Ltd and Myawaddy Bank – all included in the 2019 report – were inaccessible as of yesterday.
A page for a film production company allegedly run by the daughter of junta chief Min Aung Hlaing was also blocked.
Meta did not respond to an AFP request for comment on how long it would take to block all of the pages.
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The social media giant – Myanmar’s most popular and influential site – has been lambasted for years for its ineffective response to malicious posts, particularly against the country’s Rohingya people.
On Monday Rohingya refugees sued Facebook for USD150 billion over claims the social network is failing to stem hate speech on its platform, exacerbating violence against the vulnerable minority.
The complaint, lodged in a California court, said the algorithms that power the company promote disinformation and extremist thought that translates to real-world violence
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