Meta investigating mass ban wave on Facebook Groups likely caused by faulty AI moderation

It seems Facebook’s moderation systems are going haywire and there are no signs of any improvement. Facebook Group administrators and members are currently in an uproar, grappling with a widespread ban wave that has swept across the platform, affecting countless groups globally. 

Complaints have been pouring in from all corners, with users flocking to Reddit to share their bewildering experiences. Many group admins are reporting receiving vague violation notices, citing reasons like “terrorism-related content” or “nudity,” even when their groups are dedicated to utterly innocuous topics. Imagine a group for bird photography, nearly a million users strong, getting flagged for nudity. Or a family-friendly Pokémon group with close to 200,000 members being accused of referencing “dangerous organizations” in its title. It sounds almost comical if it weren’t so disruptive to real communities.

One Redditor, AbbasMohammed28, expressed their devastation after their iOS group of 847,000 members was taken down. “My group of 847K Member has been gone from facebook! I am so shattered and dishearted,” they wrote, adding that four of their groups were suspended for no reason. “Is Meta going nuts?”

Another user chimed in, “I was part of 4 different groups that have been removed for no reason in the last 2 weeks. I’m so sorry this is happening to everyone. It truly makes no sense.”

Luckily, it seems Meta hasn’t turned a blind eye to these reports. When TechCrunch reached out for comment, Meta spokesperson Andy Stone confirmed, “We’re aware of a technical error that impacted some Facebook Groups. We’re fixing things now.” However, he didn’t offer any further details on what exactly caused the problem.

This isn’t an isolated incident for Meta. The company has faced a barrage of similar issues recently, including a wave of individual account bans that users are still reeling from. Many users reported losing years of personal memories and small businesses being crippled, some losing over $100,000 in community investment or facing weeks-long lockouts costing thousands. Some of these individuals even turned to legal action, finding success through methods like filing consumer complaints with state Attorneys General, sending formal demand letters, or pursuing small claims court lawsuits. These issues have largely gone unaddressed by Meta in an official capacity.

The situation is so alarming that even a former Meta employee responded to comments about the ban wave stating that the company simply doesn’t prioritize customer support and actually urged users to stop using Meta platforms altogether. 

The prevailing theory among affected users, and indeed, many in the tech community, is that faulty AI-based moderation is to blame. It seems these automated systems are being a little too aggressive, flagging legitimate content for bizarre reasons. Even before all this happened, I did highlight why AI moderation still has a long way to go, and these recent mass bans prove that.

For now, those caught in the crossfire are advising each other not to appeal their group’s ban. Affected groups should simply wait a few days in hopes that Meta resolves the technical error and reverses the suspensions automatically. After all, if it’s a system-wide bug, a manual appeal might not do much good anyway. There are some reports from users claiming that Facebook has restored their pages, however, they note that they can’t see the affected page.

So for the vast majority of affected groups, it’s a waiting game. We’ll keep an eye out for any further developments and will update the article if there’s something to share.