Kansas Reflector
Case #
6676

Facebook temporarily censors news site Kansas Reflector: According to a report from the Kansas Reflector, Facebook blocked the media outlet's reporting. The Reflector noted that "[c]oincidentally, the removals happened the same day we published a column from Dave Kendall that is critical of Facebook's decision to reject certain types of advertising: 'When Facebook fails, local media matters even more for our planet's future.'" The report went on to explain that Facebook prevented the outlet from sharing the link to the column on its page, so it attempted a workaround by publishing a link to the Reflector's home page with instructions on how to find the column. Soon, all Facebook posts linking to the Reflector's site were removed from Facebook, not just those posted by the Reflector itself but anyone posting links to its stories. Reportedly the site was flagged as a potential security threat, and an error message the page received stated that it appeared the page "tried to gather sensitive information, or shared malicious software." Meta spokesman Andy Stone addressed the incident on X, saying "This was an error that had nothing to do with the Reflector’s recent criticism of Meta. It has since been reversed and we apologize to the Reflector and its readers for the mistake." A user responded to Stone's comment saying that he was still unable to share a link to the story, and included a screenshot of the error message he received, which read "Posts that look like spam according to our Community Guidelines are blocked on Facebook and can't be edited."

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Reduced Distribution
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Visibility Limited
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Visibility Limited
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Visibility Limited
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Sharing Restriction
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Sharing Restriction
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Sharing Restriction
Facebook
Fact Check
Facebook
Suspension
X / Twitter