In the wake of the storming of the US Capitol by US President Donald Trump’s supporters,
Twitter has suspended more than 70,000 accounts since Friday that were primarily
associated with QAnon, a far-right conspiracy theory. On Friday, Twitter had indicated that it
was planning to suspend accounts pushing content related to QAnon and ban all the right-
wing boosters of this conspiracy theory.
In a blog post on Monday, Twitter released a statement regarding the same. “Given the
violent events in Washington DC, and increased risk of harm, we began permanently
suspending thousands of accounts that were primarily dedicated to sharing QAnon content on
Friday afternoon,” Twitter said. “These accounts were engaged in sharing harmful QAnon-
associated content at scale and were primarily dedicated to the propagation of this conspiracy
theory across the service.”
Twitter has also said that this move could result in some accounts losing a multitude of
followers. Talking about the same, the company said that, “Our updated enforcement on
QAnon content on Twitter, along with routine spam challenges, has resulted in changes in
follower count for some people’s Twitter accounts. In some cases, these actions may have
resulted in follower count changes in the thousands.”
QAnon supporters have been known for pushing conspiracies on social media platforms,
some of which include baseless claims like Donald Trump secretly fighting a cabal of child-
sex predators, among them prominent Democrats, figures in Hollywood and, high ranking
government officials.
On Monday, Amazon stated that it was working to remove some QAnon products from its
website, citing policies that prohibit the sale of offensive and inappropriate items. This
decision comes after the Jeff Bezos led company was scrutinized for permitting the sale of
apparel with QAnon insignia, and books related to the conspiracy theory days after last
week’s attack on the US Capitol.
Twitter’s shares witnessed a sharp decline after the suspension of Trump from the social
media platform. The company has lost $5bn in market value.
The storming of the US Capitol last week resulted in the death of five people, including a
police officer who died in the line of duty. It also led to the delay in the certification of
President-elect Joe Biden’s victory as lawmakers were compelled to flee from the building.
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