Facebook suspends Russian accounts running anti-vaccine campaign against AstraZeneca

Social media giant Facebook, on Wednesday, turned heavily on the accounts that were running anti-vaccine campaigns against BioNTech-Pfizer and AstraZeneca. According to the statement released by Facebook, it has conducted an investigation in which it has found an organisation named Fazze-- a subsidiary of a UK-registered marketing firm whose operations were primarily conducted from Russia. The firm that is now banned by the social media giant used to motivate influencers with pre-existing audiences on Instagram, YouTube and TikTok to post content related to the vaccine. These influencers were asked to use particular hashtags such as #AstraZenecakills and #AstraZenecalies in order to influence the larger audience.

The campaign coincided with the period when many countries discussing emergency authorizations

According to the investigation report, this campaign came in two distinct waves, separated by five months of inactivity. First, in November and December 2020, the network posted memes and comments claiming that the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine would turn people into chimpanzees. Five months later, in May 2021, it questioned the safety of the Pfizer vaccine by posting an allegedly hacked and leaked AstraZeneca document. It is noteworthy that both phases coincided with periods when a number of governments, including in Latin America, India and the United States, were reportedly discussing the emergency authorizations for these respective vaccines.

Accounts originated in Bangladesh and Pakistan

"This campaign functioned as a disinformation laundromat. It created misleading articles and petitions on multiple forums including Reddit, Medium, Change[.]org, and Medapply[.]co[.]uk. It then used fake accounts on social media, including Facebook and Instagram, to seed and amplify this off-platform content, using crude spammy tactics," read the statement released by the Facebook investigating team. The Fazze operation began with the creation of two batches of fake Facebook accounts in late 2020, which likely originated from account farms in Bangladesh and Pakistan. They posed as being based in India. 

Anti-vaccine campaigners start with meme 

According to the report, the accounts initially posted a small volume of non-covid content — typically about Indian food or Hollywood actors. In late November, however, the operation began using some of them to post on blogging platforms and petition websites, including Medium and Change[.]org. These blogs and petitions, in English and Hindi, claimed that AstraZeneca manipulated its COVID-19 vaccine trial data and used an untried technology to create the vaccine.

(With inputs from Facebook statement)

(Image Credit: AP)