Police searched Twitter’s office in India on Monday, following the company’s decision to label multiple tweets from accounts linked to the country’s ruling party as "manipulated media".
Twitter had last week flagged up tweets from Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party for violating its synthetic and manipulated media policy, a source familiar with the matter confirmed.
This policy forbids users from sharing things that “deceptively promote synthetic or manipulated media that are likely to cause harm.”
The tweets from various BJP-linked accounts alleged that its rival Indian National Congress party had put out a document specifying failures by Mr Modi in his handling of the coronavirus.
India has seen a surge in Covid-19 cases that has overwhelmed its health system. It has recorded more than 300,000 deaths.
Congress complained to Twitter that the document was fake, according to a Reuters report, and the social media company labeled a handful of the tweets promoting it as “manipulated media”.
Among the tweets that were labelled was one from BJP spokesman Sambit Patra, which angered members of the party, who felt Twitter acted inappropriately.
Twitter declined to comment.
It last month removed or restricted access to more than 50 posts at the behest of the Indian government, including tweets that criticised its handling of the coronavirus pandemic.
The company has also previously applied its manipulated media policy to US politicians, including former president Donald Trump.
Twitter permanently suspended more than 500 accounts and blocked access to hundreds of others in India earlier this year during farm protests, acceding to a government order to limit misinformation and inflammatory content.
The story in numbers
18
This is how many recognised sects Lebanon is home to, along with about four million citizens
450,000
More than this many Palestinian refugees are registered with UNRWA in Lebanon, with about 45 per cent of them living in the country’s 12 refugee camps
1.5 million
There are just under 1 million Syrian refugees registered with the UN, although the government puts the figure upwards of 1.5m
73
The percentage of stateless people in Lebanon, who are not of Palestinian origin, born to a Lebanese mother, according to a 2012-2013 study by human rights organisation Frontiers Ruwad Association
18,000
The number of marriages recorded between Lebanese women and foreigners between the years 1995 and 2008, according to a 2009 study backed by the UN Development Programme
77,400
The number of people believed to be affected by the current nationality law, according to the 2009 UN study
4,926
This is how many Lebanese-Palestinian households there were in Lebanon in 2016, according to a census by the Lebanese-Palestinian dialogue committee
What went into the film
25 visual effects (VFX) studios
2,150 VFX shots in a film with 2,500 shots
1,000 VFX artists
3,000 technicians
10 Concept artists, 25 3D designers
New sound technology, named 4D SRL
THE 12 BREAKAWAY CLUBS
England
Arsenal, Chelsea, Liverpool, Manchester City, Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur
Italy
AC Milan, Inter Milan, Juventus
Spain
Atletico Madrid, Barcelona, Real Madrid
Company%20profile
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
What sanctions would be reimposed?
Under ‘snapback’, measures imposed on Iran by the UN Security Council in six resolutions would be restored, including:
- An arms embargo
- A ban on uranium enrichment and reprocessing
- A ban on launches and other activities with ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons, as well as ballistic missile technology transfer and technical assistance
- A targeted global asset freeze and travel ban on Iranian individuals and entities
- Authorisation for countries to inspect Iran Air Cargo and Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines cargoes for banned goods
