The Kerala Police has been carrying out intense surveillance of social media in the wake of the recent political developments in Afghanistan.
The capture of Afghanistan by the Taliban has triggered a debate worldwide, and social media users in Kerala have joined the discussions with Taliban-related content.
The state police's intelligence and cyber cell have launched thorough monitoring of such content, according to multiple sources.
The majority of the news articles, posts and memes are against the ultra-militant Islamist organisation while there have also been posts supporting the Taliban on religious and political grounds.
“When a major event occurs, people usually make comments supporting or against it. The same is the case with the Taliban incident also. We are monitoring Taliban-related content and our focus is to find out if there is an organised campaign,” a top state-level police officer told Onmanorama.
According to the senior police officer, experts in the force are looking into the nature of the content and the pattern of sharing. An officer in state intelligence said that two-tier surveillance at the district level and even statewide has been going on for the past few days.
A circle inspector in central Kerala, who was involved in terrorism-related cases in the past, also confirmed that the police have been carrying out intense monitoring of social media. “Many of those making comments supporting the Taliban turn out to be individuals with no connection to any organisation. Some of them could also be writing such posts under the influence of alcohol or drugs. Often, those with real ulterior motives and terror links are cautious not to voice their opinion in the open,” the police officer said.
Social media giant Facebook recently said that it has banned the Taliban and all content supporting it from its platforms as it considers the group to be a terrorist organisation, according to a media report. The company says it has a dedicated team of Afghan experts to monitor and remove content linked to the insurgent group.
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For years, the Taliban have used social media to spread its messages. "The Taliban is sanctioned as a terrorist organisation under US law and we have banned them from our services under our ‘dangerous organisation’ policies. This means we remove accounts maintained by or on behalf of the Taliban and prohibit praise, support and representation of them," a Facebook spokesperson told the BBC.
(This article was first published on onmanorama)
