Technology
Twitter Finally Bans Alex Jones and Infowars
The social network follows in the footsteps Apple, Facebook, YouTube, and Spotify.
September 06 2018 5:02 PM EST
September 06 2018 1:27 AM EST
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The social network follows in the footsteps Apple, Facebook, YouTube, and Spotify.
After weeks of minor penalties, Twitter permanently banned conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and his incendiary InfoWars platform on Thursday.
While Apple, Facebook, YouTube, and Spotify had already yanked Jones from their platforms, it took Jones tweeting out a series of tweets that included a nine-minute Periscope video of him in an altercation with CNN Reporter Oliver Darcy. In the footage, Jones and his camera crew compares Darcy to a member of "Hitler Youth" and claimed he was "smiling like a possum that crawled out of the rear end of a dead cow."
The behavior drove Twitter to make Jones's previous suspension permanent, reports Buzzfeed News. The commentator will no longer be allowed to register other Twitter accounts in the future.
"Today, we permanently suspended @realalexjones and @infowars from Twitter and Periscope. We took this action based on new reports of Tweets and videos posted yesterday that violate our abusive behavior policy, in addition to the accounts' previous violations," Twitter explained in a statement to Buzzfeed. "As we continue to increase transparency around our Rules and enforcement actions, we wanted to be open about this action given the broad interest in this case. We do not typically comment on enforcement actions we take against individual accounts, for their privacy."
Previously, Twitter had asked Jones to delete his offensive tweets, such as another Periscope video where he told listeners to ready their "battle rifles."
The platform has previously banned Breitbart reporter Chuck Johnson and commentator Milo Yiannopoulos.
"We will continue to evaluate reports we receive regarding other accounts potentially associated with @realalexjones or @infowars and will take action if content that violates our Rules is reported or if other accounts are utilized in an attempt to circumvent their ban," Twitter concluded.