Facebook and Twitter shutter pro-Trump network reaching 55 million accounts

On Friday, Facebook and Twitter shut down a network of fake accounts that pushed pro-Trump messages all while “masquerading” as Americans with AI-generated faces as profile photos.
In a blog post, Facebook said that it connected the accounts to a US-based media company called The BL that, it claims, has ties to Epoch Media Group. In August, NBC News first reported that Epoch Media Group was pushing messages in support of President Donald Trump across social media platforms like Facebook and Twitter. Epoch has extensive connections to Falun Gong, an eccentric Chinese spiritual community that has faced significant persecution from the country’s central government.
While the Epoch Times denied any connection to The BL in a statement to The Verge, Facebook begs to differ: “With all due respect to the publisher of the Epoch Times, he may not know executives at The BL were active admins on Epoch Media Group Pages as recently as this morning when their accounts were deactivated and the BL was removed,” a Facebook spokesperson tells us.