SAN FRANCISCO, U.S. – Amazon will suspend Parler, tech giant confirmed Saturday, sending social media network offline after Apple and Google banned it from allowing “threats of violence” following a deadly riot at the Capitol of the United States.
The Parler social network has become a haven for conservatives who say they have been censored by other social media platforms.
It had risen in popularity in recent months, becoming the No. 1 free app on Apple’s App Store on Saturday after Twitter, much larger, decided to permanently ban U.S. President Trump from his platform for his role in inciting violence at the Capitol.
Messages in support of riot police on Wednesday along with calls for new demonstrations had blossomed on the platform, leading Google to withdraw it from its app store on Friday, followed by Apple on Saturday.
Amazon then moved to delete it from its cloud hosting on Amazon Web Services, making it completely offline.
In a letter to Parler first published by Buzzfeed, Amazon said the network was not acting fast enough against the platform’s violent content.
“We’ve seen a steady increase in this violent content on your website, all of which violates our terms of service,” the letter said, the content of which was confirmed by AFP on Amazon.
Faced with riots at the Capitol this week, the letter continued, there was a “grave risk that this type of content would further incite violence.”
He will suspend the account just before midnight, Pacific Standard Time, on Sunday (0759 GMT Monday).
Because the group hosts Parler data in its cloud service, this should prevent it from working, at least temporarily.
THREATS OF VIOLENCE
Parler founder John Matz confirmed on his profile that there was a possibility the network would not be available “for up to a week,” as he seeks a new host.
“We will do our best to move to a new supplier right now,” he said.
Amazon’s decision has a much broader impact than the movements of Google and Apple.
They had made it difficult to download the Parler app, but users could access it if it was already downloaded or if they were using an Internet browser.
“We have always supported the representation of various points of view in the App Store, but there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity,” Apple said in a statement Saturday.
“Parler has not taken the appropriate steps to address the proliferation of these threats to people’s safety. We have suspended Parler from the App Store until these issues are resolved.”
Google withdrew Parler from its app store to allow “blatant content” that could incite deadly violence like the one seen at the Capitol.
Trump supporters, angry, loosened the building on Wednesday when lawmakers gathered to certify Joe Biden’s election victory on Nov. 3 and left five people dead, including a police officer.
Other major social networks such as Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat and Twitch have also suspended Trump after the attack on the Capitol.
Matze has said the platform has “many options” to move forward.
Parler started in 2018 and was initially a far-right house, but now attracts more traditional conservative voices, including Republican lawmakers.
United States Capitol riots, Trump supporters, US aviation, US airlines, Amazon Web Services, Talking, cloud computing, cloud infrastructure, ANC