Twitter removes Iran accounts disrupting US debate

Twitter says it has removed nearly 130 accounts linked to Iran that attempted to “disrupt the public conversation” during the US presidential debate.

It said it had become aware of the accounts, which “appeared to originate in Iran”, as a result of intelligence provided by the US authorities.

The social network has so far provided only four samples of the content posted by these accounts during the debate.

Two of the accounts had usernames openly supportive of President Trump.

The handle of one of them – @JackQanon – directly references the unfounded QAnon conspiracy theory Donald Trump is secretly battling a “deep state” network of Satan-worshipping elites.

The other account tweeted about the president telling the banned Proud Boys group to “stand back and stand by”, which its members have taken as a call to prepare for action.

The Proud Boys is an anti-immigrant, all-male group with a history of street violence against its opponents.

The other two were pro-Biden.

One questioned whether Fox News debate moderator Chris Wallace was impartial.

Twitter said it had acted early to remove the accounts and “they had very low engagement and did not make an impact on the public conversation”.