LEADERS’ TV ELECTION DEBATE TRIGGERS FACEBOOK RADAR TO BLOCK POSTS WITH THE WORD “VOTE”

LEADERS’ TV ELECTION DEBATE TRIGGERS FACEBOOK RADAR TO BLOCK POSTS WITH THE WORD “VOTE” Credit: Shutterstock

ACCORDING to tests run by Sky News, Facebook posts with the word ‘vote’ have been blocked after leaders’ TV election debate, triggering fears about censorship.

The test, as exclusively revealed by Sky News, shows how posts containing the word “vote” were blocked from appearing on Facebook.

Using several Facebook accounts and posting the word “vote” in the text seemingly activated a red error message to appear reading: “Your last post wasn’t published. Please try again.”

The issue appears to have affected people in the UK using Safari and Chrome browsers.

Posts which did not contain the word “vote” appeared as normal.

A Facebook spokesperson said it was looking into the issue and suggested the problem was most likely a temporary mistake in the social network’s code.

The ban, even if erroneous, has caused alarm with some Facebook users. Dan See had posted “Don’t vote for Boris Johnson” after watching the leaders’ debate on ITV and his post disappeared hours later, making him feel censored.

Other Facebook users who noticed the censorship raised concerns on Twitter.

“My Facebook won’t let me post anything on my wall with the word “vote” in it. Weird,” wrote DJ Paperwork

“If I post the word “vote” on Facebook, the post will not appear. What is this fresh hell?” said Lucy Lepchani

 

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Cristina Hodgson

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