Twitter permanently suspends Infowars and Alex Jones' accounts, saying they violate “abusive behavior” rules, will suspend other accounts he registers or uses
The Washington Post Reuters : Twitter permanently bans Alex Jones, website Infowars James Farrell / SiliconANGLE : Alex Jones and Infowars kicked off Twitter for good MacDailyNews : Twitter permanently bans Alex Jones and Infowars accounts Tweets: Twitter Safety / @twittersafety : Today, we permanently suspended @realalexjones and @infowars from Twitter and Periscope. We took this action based on new reports of Tweets and videos posted yesterday that violate our abusive behavior policy, in addition to the accounts' past violations. https://help.twitter.com/... @wired : “It's a rare thing to be alone on an island with such a dramatic scene developing in front of you.” This is how that that magical Jack Dorsey-Alex Jones photo happened: http://www.wired.com/... : M. Scott Mahaskey http://twitter.com/... Twitter Safety / @twittersafety : As we continue to increase transparency around our rules and enforcement actions, we wanted to be open about this action given the broad interest in this case. We do not typically comment on enforcement actions we take against individual accounts, for their privacy. Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : A bit of context on how Twitter likely justifies taking action now (and not for other harassing behavior). As execs told me last month, they didn't ban Jones months ago because they said (until around August) ppl weren't reporting Jones' account http://twitter.com/... Jason O. Gilbert / @gilbertjasono : When the only place you can post about the Sandy Hook hoax is Google+ pic.twitter.com/F4ZMokvjsl Casey Newton / @caseynewton : Twitter has done the right thing, after exhausting every other option http://twitter.com/... Ingrid / @ingridlunden : Even when Twitter does the right thing, it still feels like a mess. This is long overdue and took shaming on Capitol Hill, and imposing requirements for more scrutiny, to finally get over the line. That's not how it should work. https://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : I've been writing about Twitter and its struggles to enforce its rules/curb harassment for over 2 yrs now. I compiled some thoughts in a thread about why I think Twitter banned Jones today. https://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Twitter likely sees this decision as being consistent with its rules (despite the fact that many have complained about Jones' behavior on the platform for years). In August, when deplatforming Jones gained momentum, Twitter will argue it did not want to appear reactive by banning Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Of course there's a *huge* disconnect between this vision (which Jack sees as transparent and consistent enforcement) and what other people felt (that Jones was constantly acting in bad faith and that he would continue to harass, etc) Staci D Kramer / @sdkstl : Twitter is done with Alex Jones and InfoWars. Among the last straws: Jones' online behavior in DC, inc an attack on CNN's Oliver Darcy during on #periscopetv. More from @BuzzFeedNews https://www.buzzfeednews.com/ ... pic.twitter.com/9FSgIE7lG0 Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Twitter sees this as part of bigger way to gain user trust. Reality is that is likely a naive view. People will be mad Jack et al didn't do this faster. Folks on far right will see this as yet MORE censorship. If this was all a way to gain trust...not sure you can say it worked Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Nor, it appears, did they want to ban him retroactively for old violations (which is why when CNN and others provided old examples of violating tweets, they issued Jones a warning/made him delete the tweets). Matt Binder / @mattbinder : interesting. looks like all Alex Jones needed to do to get banned from Twitter is harass its founder and CEO in person on Capitol Hill http://twitter.com/... Brad Sams / @bdsams : 1 down 7000 more to go http://twitter.com/... @film_girl : Oliver forced Twitter to uphold its own TOS! https://twitter.com/... Charlie Warzel / @cwarzel : Unclear if Jones knew it was coming but...uh...this was Jones' final tweet. pic.twitter.com/EUndOgykhX See also Mediagazer
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the end of an escalating sequence rather than a snap decision. In late July, Facebook removed four of Alex Jones' videos and issued a 30-day account ban, and in mid-August Twitter said it had found seven tweets that broke its rules but stopped short of suspension — instead putting both Jones' personal account and Infowars into seven-day read-only mode.
What changed is that new posts the day before the ban gave Twitter grounds to convert accumulated past violations into a permanent action — and, notably, to extend enforcement from the account to the person, pledging to suspend any future accounts Jones registers or uses. That second commitment is the more consequential part of the announcement.
First-order effects
- Alex Jones and Infowars lose their largest remaining social distribution channel outright, and Twitter has pre-committed to suspending any replacement or alternate accounts he registers, closing the usual work-around path.
Second-order effects
- Platforms that had already acted more cautiously — Facebook's 30-day ban, Twitter's earlier decision not to suspend despite finding rule-breaking tweets — now face pressure to make their own penalties permanent and person-based rather than post- or account-based.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, deplatforming shifts from content-level takedowns to identity-level enforcement, where a user's prior violations across an account history justify permanent exclusion and ban-evasion rules become a standard enforcement layer.
The trend: Major social platforms are converging on escalating, person-level deplatforming of individual bad actors, moving beyond per-post removal toward permanent identity-based bans.