Apple, Amazon Move to Marginalize Parler -- Update
January 09 2021 - 11:24PM
Dow Jones News
By Tim Higgins and Keach Hagey
Apple Inc. and Amazon.com Inc. halted support for Parler,
dealing a major blow to a social-media service that has soared in
popularity among conservatives and sharply escalating a campaign by
tech giants to regulate content they see as dangerous in the wake
of the mob attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Amazon said Saturday it would no longer provide cloud-computing
services to Parler, and Apple suspended the company's app from the
App Store. Both companies said Parler hasn't demonstrated in recent
conversations that it can adequately address threats of violence on
the platform.
"We have always supported diverse points of view being
represented on the App Store, but there is no place on our platform
for threats of violence and illegal activity," Apple said in a
statement. "Parler has not taken adequate measures to address the
proliferation of these threats to people's safety."
The announcements from Amazon and Apple come a day after
Alphabet Inc.'s Google suspended Parler from its Play Store app
marketplace, citing violations of requirements for sufficient
moderation of content for apps it distributes.
Interest in Parler has risen since November as larger
social-network operators such as Facebook Inc. and Twitter Inc.
have become more aggressive in policing content. On Friday, Twitter
banned President Trump's personal account, sparking criticism from
conservatives online who felt the effort was biased against
them.
Parler has positioned itself as an alternative to larger
platforms. Its rules don't prohibit hate speech and false
information while banning spam, threats of violence and other
illegal activity.
"This was a coordinated attack by the tech giants to kill
competition in the market place," Chief Executive John Matze said
in a Saturday post on Parler. "We were too successful too fast. You
can expect the war on competition and free speech to continue, but
don't count us out."
Amazon, the world's largest cloud-computing company, notified
Parler on Saturday that it would suspend the company's account,
effective late Sunday, citing a violation of its terms of service.
Amazon said in a letter to Parler it had seen a steady increase in
violent content on the site and said Parler's efforts to remove
them were inadequate. The notice to Parler was earlier reported by
BuzzFeed.
Amazon said it would preserve Parler's data and aid the company
in a migration to its own servers.
--Aaron Tilley contributed to this article.
Write to Tim Higgins at Tim.Higgins@WSJ.com and Keach Hagey at
keach.hagey@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
January 09, 2021 23:09 ET (04:09 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2021 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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