Pro-Taliban posts flood social media as group takes over Afghanistan

The group has found ways to evade bans from popular social media platforms

In recent days, social media has provided an unprecedented window into the situation on the ground in Afghanistan, but desperately fleeing civilians and journalists aren’t the only ones using the platforms to get their message out: so is the Taliban.

This presents challenges for tech companies on how to regulate the content, especially if the Taliban becomes the internationally recognised government of Afghanistan, rather than be considered a terror group, as it is currently to US authorities.

More than 100 new official or pro-Taliban accounts have sprung up on social media platforms since the group took Kabul on Sunday, according to a New York Times analysis.

The posts ranged from YouTube videos from top Taliban leaders congratulating fighters, to an account posing as a grocery store but sharing exclusively pro-Taliban imagery.

“Now is the time to serve the nation and to give them peace and security,” Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, a co-founder of the Taliban, said in one video.

Taken together, the videos and posts wracked up roughly half a million views before being removed by social media countries.

Facebook and YouTube, which forbids Taliban accounts because they represent an officially designated terrorist group, told the Times they removed Taliban videos once they were discovered. Twitter has also said it has policies against posts which glorify violence.

Still, the group has managed to find ways around these safeguards by using encrypted apps like Telegram, frequently changing accounts or hashtags, or having accounts post content that’s ostensibly within allowed content guidelines but still supports the Taliban.

“So far, the approach of the tech companies is not very effective,” Ayman Aziz, an independent researcher who has studied Afghanistan and Pakistan for over a decade, told the Times. “The Taliban is establishing a new presence, with their new regime, online.”

For its part, the Taliban has lashed out against social media companies, arguing it should be allowed to spread its message online. On Tuesday, reporters asked Zabihullah Mujahid, a spokesperson for the group, about whether the Taliban would maintain free speech in Afghanistan, and he took the opportunity to blast Facebook.

“This question should be asked of those who claim to be promoters of freedom of speech who do not allow publication of foreign information and news. I can ask Facebook – this question should be asked of them,” he said in response.