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Sunday, 18 October 2020

Facebook censors Tiffany Trump, blocking users from sharing her Twitter posts on its site, before claiming it was an error

 Facebook has apologized after tweets posted by Tiffany Trump were blocked from being shared on Facebook, blaming the labelling on 'an error'.

On Friday Facebook users noticed that they were unable to share the 27-year-old Georgetown law graduate's tweets on the platform.

They received a message saying: 'This URL goes against our Community Standards on spam: twitter.com/tiffanyatrump.' 

The restriction was lifted after several hours, after the New York Post noticed the issue and asked Facebook for comment.

A Facebook spokesperson told The Post: 'The URL was incorrectly flagged by our automated systems as spam. We have corrected the error.'

Tiffany Trump, 27, found her tweets on Friday blocked from Facebook's platform

Tiffany Trump, 27, found her tweets on Friday blocked from Facebook's platform

The social network did not ban links to the Twitter accounts of Trump's other adult children, including sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, who are known for more frequently posting political content.

Facebook on Friday blocked Tiffany Trump

Facebook on Friday blocked Tiffany Trump

The issue came after Twitter and Facebook were strongly criticized for blocking news reports relating to a New York Post expose of Hunter Biden's emails.  

Twitter and Facebook had moved quickly this week to limit the spread of the story published by the conservative-leaning Post, which cited unverified emails from the Democratic presidential nominee's son that were reportedly discovered by President Donald Trump’s allies.

The story has not been confirmed by other publications.


Tiffany, pictured next to her brother Don Jr, is less politically active than her siblings

Tiffany, pictured next to her brother Don Jr, is less politically active than her siblings

San Francisco-based Twitter initially responded by banning users on Wednesday from sharing links to the article in tweets and direct messages because it violated the company’s policy prohibiting hacked content. 

But it didn’t alert users about why they couldn’t share the link until hours later.

By Friday, people were free to post the links again. 

Twitter said that was because the 'once-private' information in the article is now 'widely available' in the press and on other platforms. 

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey said the company was wrong to block web links to the unverified political story. 

'Straight blocking of URLs was wrong, and we updated our policy and enforcement to fix,' he tweeted.

'Our goal is to attempt to add context, and now we have capabilities to do that.' 

GOP senators fumed that users were unable to share the New York Post story about the Bidens

GOP senators fumed that users were unable to share the New York Post story about the Bidens

Ted Cruz was among Republicans who threatened to subpoena Twitter and Facebook over their decision to block the story

Ted Cruz was among Republicans who threatened to subpoena Twitter and Facebook over their decision to block the story 

Dorsey had first tweeted that it was 'unacceptable' the company hadn’t provided more context around its action.  

Facebook said it was 'reducing' the story’s distribution on its platform while waiting for third-party fact-checkers to verify it, something it regularly does with material that’s not banned outright from its service, though it risks spreading lies or causing harm in other ways.

Trump is now incorporating Twitter’s action into his campaign rallies, pleading with his supporters to send a message on Election Day to what he described as 'censors.'

'We're not just running against Joe Biden. We're running against left-wing media and we're running against big tech,' Trump said.    

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