Facebook removes accounts related to inauthentic behaviour in Bangladesh

San Francisco : Reiterating its commitment to act against the abuse of its platform, Facebook on Thursday removed nine Pages and six accounts in Bangladesh that were engaged in coordinated inauthentic behaviour.

The removed Pages were designed to look like independent news outlets and posted pro-government and anti-opposition content, the social networking giant found in an investigation.

"Our investigation indicates that this activity is linked to individuals associated with the Bangladesh government," Nathaniel Gleicher, Head of Cybersecurity Policy, wrote in the blog post.

"This kind of behaviour is not allowed on Facebook under our misrepresentation policy because we don't want people or organisations creating networks of accounts to mislead others about who they are, or what they're doing," Gleicher added.

The investigation found that nearly 11,900 people followed at least one of the nine removed Pages.

Around $800 was spent as part of ads on these Pages on Facebook. The first ad was run in July 2017 and the last was in November 2018.

"We are continuously working to uncover this kind of abuse. Today's announcement of the removal of these Pages is just one of the many steps we have taken to prevent bad actors from misrepresenting themselves to manipulate civic discourse," Gleicher said.

"We will continue to invest heavily in safety and security in order to keep bad actors off our platform and provide a place for people to connect meaningfully about the things that matter to them," Gleicher noted.