Electoral Commission launches probe into Russian meddling in Brexit vote using Twitter and Facebook

Did Russia meddle in the Brexit referendum campaign? Watchdog officials are investigating.
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Francesca Gillett2 November 2017
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A probe has been launched over claims Russia used Twitter and Facebook to meddle in the UK’s Brexit referendum.

The two social media giants will face the Electoral Commission amid suggestions Russian-backed companies interfered with the US presidential election, The Times reported on Thursday.

It comes after the watchdog launched an investigation into the multi-millionaire chairman of Brexit campaign Leave.EU, Arron Banks, into whether he breached finance rules with donations and loans.

The director of political finance and regulation at the Electoral Commission, Bob Posner, told the Times: “We are asking questions of Facebook and Twitter and this work is ongoing. We don't just sit back and see what lands on our doorstep.

“Clearly we have seen the allegations about interference in the American election and it is right that we are in a dialogue with companies like Facebook to ensure that nothing like that happened here. We need to make sure that impermissible donations do not come into the UK.”

Twitter promised to clamp down on its advertising after it emerged Russia paid for political ads on the site.
AFP/Getty Images

It comes after fake Facebook accounts linked to Russian agents published around 80,000 posts over two years in attempts to influence the US political landscape.

Half of American voters may have seen the biased posts, the social network revealed. Twitter separately found thousands of accounts linked to the St-Petersburg-based Internet Research Agency.

The Russian government has denied any interference in the election and Donald Trump has denied collusion.

Mr Posner told the Times: "Should our inquiries provide us with evidence that the existing campaigning rules about political finance may have been broken then we will undertake our own investigations as set out in our enforcement policy.

“If we believe other, criminal, offences may have been committed, then these will be referred to the police for investigation."

Facebook told the newspaper it did not believe the Russian groups who had bought US political advertising were involved in the UK.

Arron Banks is the subject of an investigation which launched Wednesday into the activities of firm called Better for the Country Limited, of which Mr Banks is a director.

In an emailed statement, Mr Banks said: "Allegations of Brexit being funded by the Russians ... are complete bollocks from beginning to end.” He signed off "nostrovia", a version of "na zdorovye", Russian for "cheers!".

The Electoral Commission did not mention Russia in its statement on the Mr Banks probe.

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