arrow Pro-Trump supporters on the Capitol Jose Luis Magana/AP/Shutterstock
The app known as Zello which allows smartphones to be used as walkie talkies while doubling as a social media chat tool is used by 150 million people worldwide. The app was also found to be used by some insurrectionists the day they stormed the U.S. Capitol building on January 6th, according to an article published by The Guardian.
The article was written by WNYC’s On The Media reporter/producer Micah Loewinger and Hampton Stall, founder of MilitiaWatch, a website devoted to studying militia groups.
Following that report, the CEO of Zello took the unprecedented step of deleting 2,000 channels used for recruitment and organizing by far-right militia groups, including some based in the tri-state area. The move comes after years of resistance to any kind of content moderation on the app. It also comes as social media giants have attempted to curtail hate speech on its platforms.
Why Deplatforming Might Be Bad Answer to Right-Wing Violence nymag.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from nymag.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Although Twitter and Facebook have been cracking down on some far-right users, extremists have found other ways to communicate including the smartphone app Zello, which according to the Guardian, was useful to some far-right militia members during the siege of the U.S. Capitol Building.
January 14, 2021 11:35 a.m.
The popular walkie talkie app Zello said Wednesday that it had deleted more than 2,000 channels “associated with militias and other militarized social movements” in light of evidence that users had employed the app during the storming of the U.S. Capitol last week.
In a blog post on its website, the company said it had “discovered evidence” of its app being misused by individuals while they stormed the Capitol, but hedged that “we do not have any evidence of how Zello was effectively used beyond anecdotal reports of typical social media vanity messaging.”
The channel deletions were partially out of concern that the app would be misused in the future, Zello said, “by groups who have threatened to organize additional potentially violent protests and disrupt the U.S. Presidential Inauguration Festivities on January 20th.”