Facebook take-down 2

News in Brief

On 21 June, anti-cuts activists found themselves unable to use Facebook to share news of a new website promoting the public sector strike on 30 June. When Facebook users tried to share a link for www.j30strike.org, they received an error message: “This message contains blocked content that has previously been flagged as abusive or spammy.” The links were unblocked after the Morning Star and US-based news site Mother Jones contacted Facebook for an explanation.

A Facebook spokeswoman apologised and said the site had contained links which triggered Facebook’s spam filters. She did not explain what had been flagged as spam in the first place.