“It is with deep sadness and anger that we have discovered evidence of Zello being misused by some individuals while storming the United States Capitol building last week,” the company wrote in a blogpost.
Two hours after the Guardian published this report, Zello announced it had deleted more than 2,000 “channels associated with militias and other militarized social movements”. In addition to locking some public features that would help researchers uncover more extremist content, Zello had begun purging some far-right groups as of Wednesday. The company also said it was working on a more elaborate response. Responding to a list of over 800 far-right channels, Zello said it was “prepared to take action on those”. However, the app is also home to hundreds of far-right channels, which appear to violate its policy prohibiting groups that espouse “violent ideologies”. Most coverage about Zello, which claims to have 150 million users on its free and premium platforms, has focused on its use by the Cajun Navy groups that send boats to save flood victims and grassroots organizing in Venezuela. Dynamic group conversations like this exemplify why Zello, a smartphone and PC app, has become popular among militias, which have long fetishized military-like communication on analog radio.Īfter years of public pressure, Facebook, Twitter and Discord have begun to crack down on inciting speech from far-right groups, but Zello has avoided proactive content moderation thus far. The frenzied exchange took place at 2.44pm in a public Zello channel called “STOP THE STEAL J6”, where Trump supporters at home and in Washington DC discussed the riot as it unfolded. Keep going,” said a male voice from a quiet environment. We’re excited to continue working to deliver fast, secure, reliable, and easy to use push-to-talk service for individuals and organizations of all sizes.“God bless and godspeed. We understand that not everybody will be happy with these changes but firmly believe they are necessary. This will reduce clutter and release channel names that's no longer being used. We will be automatically removing any channels that haven't been active for more than a year.
Many users were concerned that the feature made it too easy to share private conversations. However, only 1% of users ever made use of this function. The decision to remove this feature was one of our more difficult ones, as we know some people rely on it for good.
Alternatively, you can be invited with a link or a QR code. Now in order to join a channel, you need to know the exact channel name to add it. We no longer support these features as we shift away from being a social media platform to being a communication utility. This resulted in an increase in the number of active channels, while dramatically cutting down on the amount of abuse, including trolling of popular channels, roasting people, exposing private information, and violating our terms of service in channels dedicated to abusive and illegal practices. We have been working to remove these features to simplify the software and focus on building the world's best walkie talkie app, delivering crystal clear, highly reliable voice communication to the people who need it most. This has meant that some of the social features previously implemented in the app no longer supported our core mission. In 2019 we shifted our focus from social media to communication utility, with an emphasis on frontline workers and their communities. You may have noticed over the past several months that some of the social features that were once a part of the free Zello app are now gone - and you may be wondering why.
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