Google, Apple, and Amazon have suspended social media platform Parler over posts inciting violence in the United States Capitol riot. Parler has been in the news for the past few months and gained popularity. The social network says that the platform promotes ‘free speech’ and pitches itself as an alternative to Facebook and Twitter. Millions of US President Donald Trump supporter has been increasingly using Parler as other social media platforms cracked down on post inciting violence and spreading misinformation. The rising popularity of the platform can be gauged by the fact that it was listed as the No. 1 free app by Apple for its iPhones till Saturday morning. But, by night same day, it was struggling to be alive in the Apple store.
Similarly, search engine giant Google too removed the app from the play store saying Parler is not screening posts of users properly which is resulting in encouraging violence and crime. Amazon too follows the two big companies and told the platform that it would be booted over repeated violation of the company’s rules. The move comes as a big setback for Parler as the decision means that the entire platform would go offline, unless and until it managed to find a new hosting service soon. Amazon, in a letter to Parler, sent some of the posts that apparently encouraged violence. Amazon said many of these posts are still active.
The company said it clearly found that Parler had no efficient to identify content that encourages violence against others. “We are providing services across the political spectrum but we cannot allow such posts.” Reacting to the development, Parler CEO John Matze said that big tech companies are doing everything to kill competition. “They really don’t want any competition. But I have a lot of work to do in order to ensure that the data of everyone using our platform is not permanently deleted from the internet,” Matze said.
