Facebook proclaimed uncovering the influential campaigns within MENA (Middle East and Northern Africa) regions with close associations with the Saudi Arabian Government

Recently, Facebook has proclaimed to remove two influential campaigns, one emanated from the United Arab Emirates and Egypt, whereas the other rose from Saudi Arabia. These two campaigns were indulged in unauthorized behavior on Facebook and Instagram, which involved forged accounts to upgrade biased information and mislead the people against the government. Following this act, Facebook effaced 217 Facebook accounts, 144 pages, 5 groups and 31 Instagram accounts, which aggrandize these campaigns. Initially, the campaign originated from Saudi Arabia and emphasized fundamentally on the Middle Eastern countries and North African countries, which included Qatar, Saudi Arabia UAE, Morocco, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Palestine, and Lebanon. There were several motives behind such campaigns which included the credibility of Al-Jazeera News network and the leading actors were involved in criticizing neighboring countries such as Turkey, Qatar, and Iran. Undoubtedly, these campaigns were coordinated by those operators who were linked with the state of Saudi Arabia. The operators obscured their identities, yet, Facebook managed to find their links that were related to the government officials of Saudi Arabia.

Some of the findings are shared by the social network sites, which explained the impact of this first campaign which is as follows:

· Different Facebook pages were followed by 1.4 million followers in total, and its one group was joined by 26000 accounts, whereas, its Instagram accounts were followed by 145000 people.

· Approximately $108,000 was utilized for advertising the campaign on Facebook and Instagram, which were reimbursed in Saudi Riyal and US dollars.

On the contrary, the second campaign rose from the people of Egypt and the UAE, which primarily focused on the countries in the Middle East and North and East Africa. Facebook erased 259 Facebook accounts, 102 pages related to Facebook, 5 Facebook groups, 4 events ran on Facebook and 17 Instagram accounts that were engaged in promoting inappropriate activities. On social media network, the data was published about the second campaign, which is mentioned below

· Different Facebook pages were followed by 13.7 million followers in total, where approximately 9000 accounts affixed at least one of its Facebook groups and nearly 65000 followers were found on at least one of its Instagram accounts

· Approximately $167,000 were paid in dollars and Emirati dirhams to promote and advertise its content on Facebook,

Facebook condemns running any such campaigns that aim to promote obscure content and spread propaganda to destabilize the political aspect, related to any particular area.