Slashdot Mirror


Facebook Admits Blocking WikiLeaks' DNC Email Links, But Won't Say Why (thenextweb.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Facebook has admitted it blocked links to WikiLeaks' DNC email dump, but the company has yet to explain why. WikiLeaks has responded to the censorship via Twitter, writing: "For those facing censorship on Facebook etc when trying to post links directly to WikiLeaks #DNCLeak try using archive.is." When SwiftOnSecurity tweeted, "Facebook has an automated system for detecting spam/malicious links, that sometimes have false positives. /cc," Facebook's Chief Security Officer Alex Stamos replied with, "It's been fixed." As for why there was a problem in the first place, we don't know. Nate Swanner from The Next Web writes, "It's possible its algorithm incorrectly identified them as malicious, but it's another negative mark on the company's record nonetheless. WikiLeaks is a known entity, not some torrent dumping ground. The WikiLeaks link issue has reportedly been fixed, which is great -- but also not really the point. The fact links to the archive was blocked at all suggests there's a very tight reign on what's allowed on Facebook across the board, and that's a problem." A Facebook representative provided a statement to Gizmodo: "Like other services, our anti-spam systems briefly flagged links to these documents as unsafe. We quickly corrected this error on Saturday evening."

1 of 270 comments (clear)

  1. Re: The fix is in by Mr+D+from+63 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Bernie supporters got swindled out of 220+ million dollars to see Bernie be a shill for Hillary.

    So if someone named Bernie "made off" with your money, should you be A. mad at Bernie, B. mad at yourself for letting yourself getting swindled, C. mad at the system, OR D. all of the above Just curious...

    or E. mad at the Russians (This choice was paid for by the Clinton Campaign)