Facebook said Wednesday it had removed three unrelated networks of accounts that were trying to manipulate users with misinformation.
In a blog post, the company revealed that the fake accounts were based in Russia, Iran, Vietnam and Myanmar. Facebook says the networks were all trying to interfere "on behalf of a government or foreign actor."
In total, the social media giant removed 97 Facebook accounts, 21 pages and 29 groups. It also removed nine accounts from Instagram, which Facebook owns.
The Russian campaign was the largest and mostly targeted Ukraine. Individuals would pose as locals to post content about local and political news. Facebook said, "Although the people behind this network attempted to conceal their identities and coordination, our investigation found links to Russian military intelligence services."
The Iranian campaign targeted the U.S. It was much smaller than the Russian campaign, but used similar tactics. Facebook says it was linked to a network it removed last year.
The Myanmar and Vietnam campaign was found to be linked to telecom providers and a PR firm in those countries. It involved creating a fake consumer news group to spread criticism about other telecom providers in Myanmar.
Facebook says it has shared information about the networks with other social media platforms.
