Twitter suspends over 88,000 accounts linked to Saudi Arabia

Twitter has blocked around 88,000 suspicious accounts linked to a manipulation effort originating from Saudi Arabia, which was state-backed propaganda efforts. The micro-blogging platform released details of 5,929 accounts as a “representative sample” of the accounts removed for violating Twitter’s manipulation policies.

“Rigorous investigations by our Site Integrity team have allowed us to attribute these accounts to a significant state-backed information operation on Twitter originating in Saudi Arabia,” the Twitter safety team said in a blog.

'Inauthentic engagement'

In the latest social media crackdown, the safety team said that the manipulative effort was done primarily to amplify messages, written in Arabic, favourable to Saudi authorities but some of them were for western audiences, posted in the English language, including sanctions on Iran by the United States. Twitter said that such efforts were made mainly through “inauthentic engagement tactics such as aggressive liking, Retweeting and replying”.

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After investigation, Twitter traced the source of the coordinated activity to Smaat, a social media marketing and management company based in Saudi Arabia which managed Twitter accounts for “high-profile individuals”, as well as many government departments there. “Our in-house technical indicators show that Smaat appears to have created, purchased, and/or managed these accounts on behalf of — but not necessarily with the knowledge of — their clients,” said Twitter. The safety team has not only permanently suspended Smaat from accessing Twitter’s services but also the accounts of Smaat’s senior executives.

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Twitter said that the use of third-party automated tools to Tweet helpful content, like crisis response information or weather updates, is not the violation of rules. However, the accounts were involved in amplifying “non-political content” at high volumes to mask overall platform manipulation originating from these accounts. “These tactics made it more difficult for observers to identify political Tweets in the timelines of accounts, which mostly shared automated, non-political content,” the team said. The safety team emphasised that they are to serve the public conversation around the world and not state-sponsored information campaigns which undermine the company’s mission, principles, and policies.

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