March 17, 2023
A Persian-language content moderator for Instagram and a former content moderator have told the BBC that Iranian intelligence agents offered them bribes to remove Instagram accounts of Iranian journalists and activists.
“I was offered 5,000 to 10,000 euros ($5,350-$10,700) to delete an account. They were especially after removing Masih Alinejad,” the former reviewer told BBC Persian.
Alinejad is an Iranian-American author and activist. Last year, the US Justice Department said Iranian officials sought to kidnap her from her Brooklyn home and take her back to Iran.
Both content moderators also accused some of their Iranian colleagues of “pro-regime bias” when reviewing posts on the photo-sharing service dealing with the recent spate of anti-regime protests over food price hikes and then over the building collapse in Ahvaz.
The protests received very little coverage in Iranian media, meaning Iranians had to rely on social media to learn what was happening. As the unrest continued, users noticed that some videos posted on Instagram were being removed.
The former content moderator told the BBC he “personally knew some reviewers who supported the Iranian regime and received instructions from Iran.” The man worked for Telus International, the company Facebook, now Meta, hired to deal with reports and complaints from Instagram and Facebook users.
Telus International, whose Persian-language moderators are based in Germany, told the BBC it believed the allegations were false, but that it took them very seriously and had launched an investigation into their merits.
The company said in a statement, “The processes in place eliminate the ability of reviewers to insert personal or political opinions into their job. Our team members review a randomized set of content to determine if it violates our client’s policies, standards and guidelines, removing any room for subjectivity.
“These decisions are frequently audited for accuracy and to uncover any potential biases. Additional reviews have been undertaken and have found no validity to these claims.”
A spokesperson for Meta Platforms told the BBC: “We see no evidence to support these claims. Our review teams remove content that breaks our rules. Those rules are deliberately detailed to avoid room for bias or interpretation, and reviewers’ decisions are regularly audited to help ensure accuracy.”
However, the current and former content moderators who spoke to the BBC said only about 10 percent of their decisions were audited.
A third former moderator told the BBC that the Iranians working for Telus International, many of whom are students, were “decent people who follow the company’s guidelines”.
All three interviewees said it was likely that some videos of the protests were removed because they included people shouting: “Death to Kha-menehi.”
Meta has previously said that its guidelines around incitement of violence prohibit calls for the death of a head of state. However, in Iran the phrase “Marg bar…,” while literally translating as “Death to…,” is commonly chanted at protests as meaning “Down with…,” rather than to express an actual threat.