Facebook Deletes Account of Russian Activist Who Exposed Prison Abuse – IOTW Report

Facebook Deletes Account of Russian Activist Who Exposed Prison Abuse

WFB– Facebook on Monday deleted the account of a Russian activist who exposed abuse in the country’s prison system, only to reinstate the page following a public outcry.

Vladimir Osechkin is the founder of Gulagu.net, a watchdog site that last month rose to prominence after it posted thousands of photos and videos that show Russian security forces torturing and raping prisoners. Late Monday night, visitors to Osechkin’s account saw a notice saying, “This content isn’t available right now. When this happens, it’s usually because the owner only shared it with a small group of people, changed who can see it or it’s been deleted.”

But Gulagu.net said Osechkin had not changed the settings on his page and that the removal was “another attempt by the Russian special services to destroy Gulagu.net and Vladimir Osechkin personally.”

Gulagu.net had posted a new trove of graphic videos before the account was removed.

The page had been restored without explanation by Tuesday afternoon. Facebook did not respond to multiple requests for comment on the issue.

But Russia has escalated its pressure on social media companies to punish political dissidents, fining Facebook and the messaging app Telegram in June for not removing “banned content.” The removal of Osechkin’s page also fits a pattern for Facebook. The company often deletes high-profile deleted pages and restores them after users publicly complain, saying the removal was an error. more here

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