If you've been on Twitter for a while, you might know QAnon, an online group of conspiracy theorists that have been dubbed as a "virtual cult," who have been spreading disinformation throughout the internet, specifically on the platform.
Twitter's Move Against QAnon
Now, Twitter has suspended 7,000 accounts linked to QAnon, according to CNN.
"We've been clear that we will take strong enforcement action on behavior that has the potential to lead to offline harm," the platform's safety team announced on a tweet this Tuesday, July 22. "In line with this approach, this week, we are taking further action on so-called 'QAnon' activity across the service."
Moreover, they are doing more actions against the conspiracy theory group, and they are expecting that 150,000 Twitter accounts will be affected by their move.
Based on the news outlet, QAnon began as a single conspiracy theory but has evolved and progressed with members believing every claim they make.
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Chrissy Teigen Backs Up the Move
Just last week, the group had attacked actress and model Chrissy Teigen with false claims and even went as far as to send death threats, according to the Washington Post.
Because of the incident, Teigen blocked around 1 million accounts and threatened to leave the platform, along with her 13 million followers--and with Twitter's move against the group, Teigen has their support, saying the group has "no right to coordinate attacks and make death threats."
"It is not an 'opinion' to call people pedophiles who rape and eat children," Teigen said.
Although the model did back up Twitter's decision to crack down QAnon, the company denied the claims that their move was motivated by the model's conflict last week. Instead, their decision was due to the emerging trend of coordinated abuse by QAnon groups.
The Group's Claims
Among their most prominent theories is that tons of A-list celebrities and politicians are working in tandem with various governments around the world to engage in child sex abuse and that there is a "deep state" effort to bring down President Donald J. Trump.
Al Jazeera noted that "deep state" refers to a team of elites from entertainment, intelligence, businesses, and political fields and that they are at a "secret war" with the POTUS.
They decided to move throughout the last few weeks against QAnon as their followers have been causing increasing harm.
The QAnon conspiracy theory group has been making unfounded claims and would amplify them with out-of-context and doctored proof on social media to support the claims.
The group's followers have also claimed that "Q" or "QAnon" is a mole within the president's inner circle and reveals tidbits of what's happening behind the scenes unbeknownst to the public.
Still, there is no known evidence that any of their claims are factual.
Besides Twitter, QAnon's claims have also been spreading on mainstream social media, spreading across massive platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and TikTok.
Nevertheless, Facebook hasn't accurately made a massive move against QAnon or any other groups that are spreading disinformation and hate on the platform, except when they removed 20 accounts, six groups, and five pages linked to the group in April of this year.
Thus, around 1,000 advertisers are planning to boycott Facebook until Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of the social media giant, imposes aggressive actions against all content that promotes hate, violence, and disinformation.
