Starting April 12, 2020, Russia’s state prosecutor’s office will block posts on social media that criticize isolation measures in the fight against COVID-19, as well as those spreading false news, reported the Macedonian-language portal Tocka.com.mk. With a grandiose headline, the portal announced that Russia will fight misinformation and paranoia among citizens who have recently published various fake news about the isolation measures and other measures of the Russian government.
Let’s look at the facts, about who is actually writing fake news!
According to the European Union’s anti-counterfeiting service EUvsDisinfo, most of the fake news about the coronavirus comes from Russia.
In just four months since the pandemic began, more than 8,000 fake Russian-originated content has been registered. According to the service, on average, 60 fake texts related to COVID-19 in different languages are transmitted from Russia every week, from English to Russian and from Serbian to Arabic.
Russia is also a source of fake news for the 5G network.
The New York Times, in an analysis of the fake news for the 5G network, it is stated that the US service of the Russian state television Russia Today, constantly propagandizes against the introduction of this new technology by sowing fear of various diseases such as cancer or the like.
The media cites several examples in which the Russian service is attacking the introduction of this technology, while conveying statements by analysts who are convinced that this act of Russia is the result of jealousy of the progress of the United States and other countries in this area.
This analysis also presents the opinions of several scientists who point out that “The higher the radio frequency, the less it penetrates the human skin, reducing the exposure of the internal organs of the body, including the brain.”
Deleting some news can turn into mass censorship
Given the above-mentioned facts of Russia’s involvement in the production of fake news, it is justified to worry that the deletion of posts on social networks criticizing the isolation measures in the fight against COVID-19 could turn into a mass censorship of all news and criticism of the Russian government.
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