Social networking giant Facebook has deleted accounts that belong to those administering the Fabrications About The PAP page. Facebook said it took this decision as these accounts were violating its policies. PAP or People's Action Party is the ruling party of Singapore.
A Facebook spokesperson said on Sunday these accounts were discovered during ongoing proactive work and added that "this action is based on the behavior of these accounts, not based on the content they posted." The removal of the accounts resulted in the page being unpublished on the Facebook platform that had over 250,000 likes.
Removal of Accounts
As per the social networking company, it removes accounts that violate the company policies, including people who use fake accounts, misrepresent themselves, or involve in behavior designed to enable other violations of its community standards.
Facebook said the account owners must provide additional information to confirm the authenticity of the accounts if they are willing to continue using the platform. If the account owners fail to confirm the verification or any violation of Facebook policies, then the accounts will be removed.
It was on June 11 that the company said it has taken strict actions against several Facebook accounts for misrepresentation, as part of measures to protect the integrity of the upcoming Singapore General Election, which is scheduled on July 10. The teams of the social media site have been looking out for what it called "inauthentic behavior" on Facebook.
Earlier Facebook's head of public policy Clara Koh said, "So in Singapore ahead of our elections, we are doing ongoing and corrective sweeps to look for this type of activity on our platform."
Zero-Tolerance
Singapore declared a zero-tolerance policy against online misleading information and fake news, which has been booming in the Republic for the past few years. Last year, the Singapore Democratic Party (SDP), which has no seat in the parliament posted on its website and Facebook page, arguing that an increasing number of white-collar workers were losing their jobs.
Later, the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) ordered the party to place a correction notice on such posts because it said jobs for professionals, executives managers, and technicians had been steadily rising since 2015.
In 2019, the Ministry of Education (MOE) directed opposition politician Lim Tean, the founder and secretary-general of Peoples Voice (PV) party, to correct a Facebook post about foreign students receiving more government funding than Singapore-based students.
Recently three members of the PV party were approached by the police in Pasir Ris, after they were seen carrying a placard with photos of MPs from the People's Action Party. Police said in a statement that as per their understanding, these members were "Using the placard to demonstrate against other politicians. They also had four other placards with the same photo collage in their possession. Their actions thus amounted to a public demonstration, which requires a police permit."
