Church and State blog: Fighting for survival in London: Facebook's concerted campaign against our Church and State website shows no signs of waning (WITH UPDATE 15/12/2018: re Block 52 DAY 8)

Friday, November 02, 2018

Fighting for survival in London: Facebook's concerted campaign against our Church and State website shows no signs of waning (WITH UPDATE 15/12/2018: re Block 52 DAY 8)

This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site.
-Don Collins, President of ISAF, an NGO dedicated to helping women

Ted Cruz asks if Facebook is a "neutral public forum". Mark Zuckerberg admits Silicon Valley is an "extremely left-leaning place" and claims he tries to make sure the company does not have a political bias. pic.twitter.com/gaWw7ORQDY
— Josh Caplan (@joshdcaplan) April 10, 2018

Facebook does not have a political bias? The social network's blocks against our Church and State website have gone from 47 days in 2017 - when we topped 3 million hits in the first 11 months despite the blocks - to 155 days so far this year (more than 5 out of 10 months). Last March they blocked me from posting Church and State articles in groups four times (for 29 out of 31 days), and all without explanation. Tonight I received this notification of their 49th block against Church and State since 1 December 2015:

These notifications without an explanation come out of the blue. There's absolutely no way of knowing whether or not the rest of this month will be another wipeout from Facebook, and without an explanation being given.

Re: Facebook

Paragraph 40 of Declan's updated complaint to the United Nations under Article 19 (freedom of expression) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.

40. The Applicant's wife has encountered numerous problems with Facebook. In August 2011, then Home Office Minister Lynne Featherstone wrote to Facebook on the Applicant's behalf, asking that they explain why she had been barred (see Annex 19, p. 47). The bar was subsequently lifted; however, since December 2015, Facebook has blocked her from posting to groups 37 times, and for up to 12 days at a time (see Annex 22, p. 50). In December 2015, Shadow Home Office Minister Lyn Brown made an enquiry on the Applicant's behalf to Facebook UK Managing Director Steve Hatch asking if he could offer an explanation as to the terms and conditions the Applicant's wife was alleged to have broken twice previously (see Annex 20, p. 48). To the best of the Applicant's knowledge, Mr. Hatch did not respond to this letter. The Applicant's wife only ever posts to groups that are specific to an article's subject and that she is well familiar with, and she only ever posts articles that she has already published on the Church and State website. This concerted campaign against the Church and State website escalated in November 2017 after the site topped more than 3 million hits over the previous eleven months [emphasis added]. In March 2018, the Applicant's wife was blocked from posting to groups four times (for 29 out of 31 days), and all without explanation. The following is taken from her complaint to Facebook dated 28 January 2018 (see Annex 21, p. 49):

"Seldom has Facebook made it clear why I am being blocked. Today's block records as the 30th time Facebook has blocked me from posting in groups since 1 December 2015. The only explanation given at the time of one of these blocks has been "spam" (received today); and Facebook has only responded to four of my previous 29 appeals, citing "technical problems" in each instance. Nonetheless, I have been blocked from posting to groups a total of 43 days (and counting) in the last three months alone."

Facebook UK & Ireland Managing Director Steve Hatch

UPDATE 15 December (11.22am): When it comes to blocking me from posting Church and State articles in groups, Facebook's 49th block since 1 December 2015 was lifted on 9 November (8 days). I have, however, subsequently been blocked three times from doing the same (an additional 24 days), most recently for the 52nd time from 8 December until tonight and without an explanation as usual.

Facebook blocks

2015
1st 1-4 December 2015 (4 days)
2nd 5-7 December 2015 (3 days)
Total: 7 days
---------------------------------------------------
2016
3rd 6-9 January 2016 (4 days)
4th 12-15 January 2016 (4 days)
5th 20-22 January 2016 (3 days)
6th 13-16 February 2016 (4 days)
7th 23-26 March 2016 (4 days)
8th 20-23 May 2016 (4 days)
9th 25-30 May 2016 (6 days)
10th 1-3 July 2016 (3 days)
11th 7-8 September 2016 (2 days)
12th 21-22 September 2016 (3 days)
13th 27-28 September 2016 (2 days)
14th 29 September - 3 October 2016 (5 days)
15th 4-5 October 2016 (2 days)
16th 18-23 October 2016 (6 days)
17th 9-14 December 2016 (6 days)
Total: 58 days
---------------------------------------------------
2017
18th 4-6 January 2017 (3 days)
19th 20-23 January 2017 (4 days)
20th 17 May 2017 (1 day)
21st 19 June 2017 (1 day)
22nd 19-21 August 2017 (3 days)
23rd 19 September 2017 (1 day)
24th 28 October - 8 November 2017 (12 days)
25th 23-30 November 2017 (8 days)
26th 7-8 December 2017 (2 days)
27th 10-17 December 2017 (8 days)
28th 28 December 2017 - 31 December 2018 (4 days)
Total: 47 days
---------------------------------------------------
2018
28th (cont.) 1-4 January 2018 (4 days)
29th 16-23 January 2018 (8 days)
30th 28 January - 4 February 2018 (8 days)
31st 12-19 February 2018 (8 days)
32nd 26 February - 5 March 2018 (8 days)
33rd 7-14 March 2018 (8 days)
34th 16-23 March 2018 (8 days)
35th 24 March - 1 April 2018 (9 days)
36th 4-11 April 2018 (8 days)
37th 14-21 April 2018 (8 days)
38th 2-5 June 2018 (4 days)
39th 13-14 June 2018 (2 days)
40th 17-24 June 2018 (8 days)
41st 10-17 July 2018 (8 days)
42nd 21-28 July 2018 (8 days)
43rd 31 July - 3 August 2018 (4 days)
44th 10-17 August 2018 (8 days)
45th 4-6 September 2018 (3 days)
46th 20-27 September 2018 (8 days)
47th 30 September - 7 October 2018 (8 days)
48th 12-20 October 2018 (9 days)
49th 2-9 November 2018 (8 days)
50th 15-22 November 2018 (8 days)
51st 28 November - 5 December 2018 (8 days)
52nd 8-15 December 2018 (8 days) (ongoing)
Total: 179 days

January 2018: 16 days
February 2018: 15 days
March 2018: 29 days
April 2018: 17 days
May 2018: No blocks in May
June 2018: 14 days
July 2018: 17 days
August 2018: 11 days
September 2018: 12 days
October 2018: 16 days
November 2018: 19 days
December 2018: 13 days (until 15 December)

I previously reported problems with my Facebook Network for Church Monitoring page on 4 November (see here). Sometimes these sort of problems present themselves in clusters:

6 June 2018

Dear Facebook,

This afternoon I have been unable to post directly to my Page, schedule posts or view my scheduled posts. Please see the attached screenshot, which shows the removal of my facility to post directly to my Page and to view my scheduled posts.

I will not know until this evening whether or not my scheduled posts are posting.

Thank you in advance for your assistance in these matters.

Sincerely,
Lola Heavey
https://www.facebook.com/networkforchurchmonitoring/

Despite our distinguished list of 191 Honorary Associates from around the world, blocks on access to our Church and State website also continue unabated; see my post 27 June, SITE BLOCKS: The blocks on access to our Church and State website continue unabated (WITH UPDATE 15/12/2018: re 1,453rd block since 26 July 2016). Then there's the daily targeting to fluctuating degrees of category pages throughout the site. For example, as I point out in my earlier post about Royal Mail misdelivering our mail, the second article below has more than 1/2 million Facebook likes/shares (not zero).

We compare the on-off targeting of our laptops with the removal of our flat door in 2012; see my post of 27 November, The assault on my primary laptop runs into a record-breaking fourth week (WITH UPDATE - DAY 44 15/12/2018). And it's not just Facebook blocks, blocks on access to our Church and State website, the daily targeting to fluctuating degrees of category pages throughout the site, and the ongoing assault on now our two primary laptops. Since 26 May 2017, I have been recording internet cuts to boot; see my post of 7 July, INTERNET CUTS: Are 45-minute Internet cuts to be the new norm? We pay British Telecom £850 per year for broadband (WITH UPDATE 15/12/2018: re 294th Internet cut since 26 May 2017). Perhaps of particular importance in all this is the fact that Church and State topped more than 3 million hits in 11 months from January to November 2017 (27 Facebook blocks ago), and despite the even then far from level playing field.

From My Picks:

8 May 2018: Threat to life: Updated complaint to the United Nations under Article 19 (freedom of expression) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Today we are cut off the internet for a half an hour

'Let me recommend an important web site churchandstate.org.uk. Operating out of London this well-designed and exciting web site covers church-state, population, climate change and other issues. Check it out.' Edd Doerr, President, Americans for Religious Liberty

http://churchandstate.org.uk/about/

Church and State

MAYOR OF LONDON RSI PROPERTY
DAY 406 IN A WEEKLY PERIODIC TENANCY
SUBJECT TO A SECTION 21 NOTICE

(SEE PARA. 3 BELOW)

1. Our 308 Honorary Associates include 20 Nobel Prize laureates. Declan and I are engaged in a project that deals with the publication of issues significant to social policy in a number of key areas, e.g., climate change, population, futurism, atheism, and free speech. Established as Network for Church Monitoring, a non-profit company limited by guarantee, our main publication, found at the website, Church and State, calls attention to subjects, not the least which have been critical of the interaction between religious and secular institutions. We have been the target of numerous threats and actions, e.g., the former resulting in threats to Declan's life, and the latter, which have led to vandalism. The various incidents are on record with the police and other official agencies.

2. There are no less than 63 Nobel Prize laureates on the Church and State website from 20 Honorary Associates, eight articles, nine book excerpts and 33 petition signatories. (For example, one Nobel laureate signed our Nobel petition in support of human embryonic stem cell research and gave us permission to excerpt from one of his books.) Our list of associates also includes 18 US National Medal laureates, and six Turing Award laureates (the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in computer science). We have published one article and excerpted from the books of seven members of the British House of Lords. And there are 31 knighted professors on the site from 13 Honorary Associates, one book excerpt and 21 petition signatories. These figures are despite the never-ending assault on our email (this link reveals the targeting of our emails to, among others, a close colleague in Washington, DC as well as space advocates and Nobel laureates).

3. This is Day 406 for us living under the threat to life of a 'no fault' eviction by Peabody Trust.[1] We live in a Mayor of London's Rough Sleepers Initiative (RSI) property. Peabody's appalling new terms of tenancy have forced us into an unstable weekly periodic tenancy that poses a threat to Declan's life and inhibits our ability to exercise our rights. Declan accumulated quite a history with the Housing Ombudsman Service before he received the Ombudsman's decision not to investigate a referral from Lyn Brown MP on jurisdictional grounds. The Ombudsman was asked to consider whether or not our tenancy has been renewed like for like; and whether, if not, it should be in light of the landlord having accused us of not signing a like-for-like agreement. The Equality and Human Rights Commission will not accept a referral of discrimination from Ms Brown, the Commission's helpline (EASS) having grossly distorted the complaint against Peabody. We no longer have pro se access to the courts (see next paragraph).

4. This eviction matter came before District Judge Ruth Fine at the Central London County Court on 30 June 2020, when both counsel for St Mungo's (the charity in effective control of our tenancy) and Declan presented their positions. Declan lost the case and was ordered to pay £1,850 in costs. A publishing colleague in America cleared these costs within 24 hours of my blog post about this hearing for strike out on a related issue that was the essence of the claim, i.e., that St Mungo's would take a phone call to confirm that we are clients of the Mayor of London's RSI programme. Within a week of the hearing, St Mungo's had agreed to take this phone call for us both, the Court having ruled that they were not obliged to do so despite our circumstances. This time we escaped bankruptcy (counsel for St Mungo's asked for £3,407.50 in costs), but consider that to seek pro se access to justice in the courts has become far too dangerous for us. Declan currently has before the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman the decision of the Information Commissioner that allows St Mungo's to continue processing coercive support plans without our knowledge or consent and that also poses a threat to his life.

5. When it comes to traffic, we have had 10.7 million hits in the past three years on Facebook; however, I left the platform on 13 March 2021 for one year rather than risk being banned for life. It is indisputable that with any sort of level playing field Church and State would have far exceeded 2.5 million hits last year. In addition to a large variety of blocks without explanation, Facebook had so severely restricted our Page's distribution by October 2020 that it was almost as good as an unpublished page.[2] Currently, we are up to their 85th block since 1 December 2015, and as usual without an explanation. This block records as one half of their 3rd double block in the first five weeks of this year that lasted 60 days. Our traffic has also been curtailed by over 2.5K blocks on access to Church and State since 26 July 2016, including 29 full distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attacks since 17 May 2019 that have lasted for as long as 54 hours at a time.[3] About 70% of our hits are from Americans.

"This is precisely the hard hitting kind of response needed to clarify the unfair way Facebook is treating your highly reputable site." Don Collins, Founder, International Services Assistance Fund, Washington DC

Last updated: 26/06/21

_________________________

[1] Once a fixed term has elapsed, the landlord has the option to seek eviction even if the tenant has upheld their obligations in full (though of course the landlord must still apply for and obtain a county court order).

[2] 17/10/20: We have permission to publish this ISAF letter of 30 September to Facebook COO Sheryl Samberg. Facebook has so severely restricted our Page's distribution since 4 September that it's almost as good as an unpublished page

[3] Since October 2019, we have been defining a full DDoS attack as having such a high volume of up to 4-minute blocks on access to Church and State that we don't bother recording them all.

Church and State blog

Friday, November 02, 2018

Fighting for survival in London: Facebook's concerted campaign against our Church and State website shows no signs of waning (WITH UPDATE 15/12/2018: re Block 52 DAY 8)

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