By Pooya Stone
Social media giants Facebook and Twitter announced on Tuesday that they had removed hundreds of fake accounts used in a covert Iranian influence campaign.
The Iranian propaganda campaign pushed posts that criticised Donald Trump and Israel, while promoting the Iran nuclear deal, according to an investigation by cyber security firm FireEye, who discovered the malign operation.
Iran Focus
London, 24 August – Iran’s Lebanese proxy group Hezbollah is stronger than ever and has significantly expanded its stockpile of weapons, according to a televised statement by the group’s leader Hassan Nasrallah, as part of a broadcast marking the anniversary of the 2006 war with Israel.
The Centre for Strategic and International Studies reports that Hezbollah’s involvement in the Syrian conflict on behalf of Iran allowed the group to increase its weapons’ holdings as well as improve training and planning.
Iran Focus
London, 23 August – On Tuesday, in a press release, Facebook announced that an Iranian propaganda campaign created fake Bernie Sanders supporters online.
The Facebook Newsroom website said that it had removed 652 pages associated with political influence campaigns traced to Iran from its social media platform, “including coordinated inauthentic behavior that originated in Iran and targeted people across multiple internet services in the Middle East, Latin America, UK and US.”
Iran Focus
London, 23 August – The son of a founder of Lebanon’s Hezbollah has accused the pro-Iranian militia of running torture and kidnapping operations in Dahya, a suburb or the capital, Beirut.
Claiming that the militia built a number of secret detention centers out of sight of the Lebanese government, Hussein Mazloum, also known as Hajj Wala, says that he was detained in one of these centers for nine months. He alleged that he was subjected to the “worst forms of torture and humiliation” during his time there.
Iran Focus
London, 22 August – Facebook and Twitter announced on Tuesday night that they’ve thwarted a network of suspicious accounts that appear to come from Iran.
First, Facebook reported that it had removed over 650 pages, groups, and accounts for “coordinated inauthentic behaviour”. Then, less than an hour later, Twitter tweeted that it had taken down nearly 300 accounts, many from Iran.
This is an important reminder not just that Iran is now one of the adversaries targeting American tech companies, but also that the Silicon Valley businesses are prepared to work together and proactively share these details with their competitors to remove malign influences from their social media sites.
Iran Focus
London, 22 August – Simultaneous interactive conference of Iranian Communities in 20 major cities & capitals throughout Europe & North America
They tried to bury us, they didn’t know we were seeds.
Iran Focus
London, 22 August – A trio who claim association with Britain’s Channel 4 are working with Iran to demonise the Iranian Resistance in Albania.
On Friday, August 10, a television crew set up outside the Albanian headquarters of Iranian Resistance group, the People’s Mujahedin Organisation of Iran (PMOI/MEK), and began to secretly film the compound, despite not having received permission or having informed the MEK of this action.
Iran Focus
London, 21 August – It has been reported that two Iranians have been accused of spying for Iran in the United States. The two men were indicted earlier this week.
Reports say that the men were carrying out surveillance on a Jewish establishment. They were also accused of gathering information on backers of the Mujahideen-e Khalq (MEK), the main opposition group to the Iranian dictatorship.
The U.S. Justice Department named the two men as Ahmadreza Mohammadi-Doostdar and Majid Ghorbani, aged 38 and 59 respectively. Mohammadi-Doostdar had dual U.S. Iranian citizenship and Ghorbani is an Iranian citizen living in California.
The men were arrested on Thursday 9th August on the charge of carrying out surveillance on behalf of Iran.
Iran Focus
London, 21 August – A critically ill Iranian refugee child has finally been flown from Nauru to Australia with his family, after extreme delays by the Australian Border Force (ABF) that experts are calling ‘inhumane and unnecessary’.
For over 20 days, a 12-year-old refugee has refused all food and medical treatment despite being critically ill, as the ABF initially tried to split up the family when taking the boy, known only as M, for treatment. This could, of course, result in the family never being reunited.
Despite being gravely ill, M refused to leave without his family and, after several failed attempts to move him on commercial flights and by air ambulance, the ABF finally allowed M to be medivacced, along with his mother, stepfather, and sister, on Tuesday afternoon (local time).
Iran Focus
London, 21 August – The special forces branch of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) is seeking to “wreak havoc” at the annual Hajj pilgrimage in Saudi Arabia by recruiting Islamic extremists at the ritual pilgrimage, according to Iranian dissident group, the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK).
MEK representative Shahin Gobadi warned that the Iranian Regime was attempting to “exploit the Hajj situation” by deploying Revolutionary Guards and cautioned the over two million Muslims visiting Mecca to be wary of the Regime’s attempts to carry out terrorist activity abroad.
