Digital Citizens Alliance: “Social media platforms continue to have difficulty removing illegal offers of opioids, steroids and COVID-19 “vaccines.” Even after they have been alerted of specific posts and long past when they have made public pledges to do a better job of making their services safe for U.S. consumers, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram and Telegram are not backing their words with action, new research from the Digital Citizens Alliance (Digital Citizens) and the Coalition for a Safer Web (CSW) shows. The “Digital Weeds” report revisited past research conducted by Digital Citizens and CSW to determine if social media platforms have truly addressed illicit activity that was brought to their attention. Researchers searched for old posts and previous users who were attempting to conduct illegal activity. In some cases, the research teams found accounts and similar posts from the same users, whose posts were taken down years earlier, still up on the platforms. In some cases, the research teams found current accounts and similar posts from the same users who were identified years earlier.  In addition, researchers also found that the fraudulent sale of COVID-19 vaccines, which was identified by DCA and CSW in February, remains despite calls for action by Facebook’s Advisory Board to address COVID-19 vaccine misinformation and related dangers. But a lot remains the same:

• Criminal activity and/or illicit activity highlighted in previous research, such as the selling of opioids, steroids, and malware, can still be found easily today.
• Many videos and posts shared in prior DCA and CSW reports and/or with media contacts are still available across numerous social media platforms.
• The platforms still have advertising from premium, respected brands running next to videos and/or posts for illegal and/or illicit item
• The platforms allow for communication between drug pushers and potential buyers. Whether by containing phone numbers and emails in videos and/or posts or allowing for conversations to happen in chats.
• The platforms’ algorithms amplify connectivity between potential buyers and sellers of illegal and/or illicit items. Researchers, acting as potential buyers looking for drugs, showed that when they look for drugs on Instagram, Instagram will in turn begin directing drug sellers back to the potential buyer.
• When outed by media outlets, platforms will often take down specific videos mentioned by reporters, but not address the larger problem. This leaves consumers vulnerable to similar, or sometimes even the same scams, that inspired the news coverage in the first place…”