Parler, a popular social networking app among conservatives and supporters of President Donald Trump, went offline after Amazon withdrew its support following deadly riots in the US Chapter last week.
The application is based on the cloud computing power provided by Amazon Web Services.
AWS said on Saturday that Parler will no longer provide cloud services to the company starting Sunday at 23:59 PT, according to an e-mail obtained by CNBC. An Amazon spokesman confirmed the authenticity of the letter to CNBC, but declined to comment further.
John Matze, founder and CEO, said in a statement Monday that the Parler app will work “more than expected,” as other cloud hosting companies do not want to work with Parler in light of Amazon’s press releases. Google and Apple.
“We will probably drop more than we expected,” Matze wrote. “This is not due to software restrictions – we have our software and everyone’s data ready to work. Rather, statements by Amazon, Google and Apple to the press about giving up our access have made most other providers give up our support for us. “
He added: “Most people with enough servers to host us have closed their doors. We will update everyone and update the press when we return online.”
AWS told Parler by e-mail that it had given 98 examples to Parler of posts that “clearly encourage and incite violence.” Among the posts he reported to Parler, which were viewed by CNBC, users of the platform made violent threats to “liberal leaders, liberal activists #blm leaders and supporters,” among other groups.
Screenshots of the Parler app viewed by CNBC show users posting references to firing squads, as well as calls to bring weapons to the presidential inauguration later this month.
Matze condemned the movements of technology giants in a series of posts on Parler over the weekend, claiming that his platform removed its violent content and added that community guidelines do not allow Parler to be knowingly used for criminal activities.
“It simply came to our notice then [sic] the last hope for free speech and free information. What they are doing is unprecedented, unfounded and absolutely disgusting, “Matze wrote late Saturday night.” They want to keep their monopoly on speech. “
In response, an AWS spokesman told CNBC that AWS provides services to customers across the political spectrum and confirmed that the suspension was for content that the company says clearly encourages violence.
Apple removed Parler from the iPhone App Store on Saturday. The company said posts on Parler related to the US Chapter riot last week included calls for violence, which violate Apple’s rules against unacceptable content.
“We have always supported various views represented on the App Store, but there is no place on our platform for threats of violence and illegal activity,” an Apple representative said in a statement. “Parler has not taken appropriate action to address the proliferation of these threats to human safety. We have suspended Parler from the App Store until these issues are resolved.”
Google removed Parler from its Android app store, Google Play, on Friday.
“To protect the safety of users on Google Play, our long-term policies require that apps that display user-generated content have moderation and enforcement policies that eliminate huge content, such as posts that incite violence,” he said. Google spokesperson.
“All developers agree with these terms, and I reminded Parler of this clear policy in recent months. We are aware of the ongoing posting in the Parler application that seeks to incite continued violence in the US. We recognize that there may be a reasonable debate about the content of policies and that it may be difficult for applications to remove all infringing content immediately, but for us to we distribute an application via Google Play, applications need to implement robust moderation for huge content. Given this ongoing and urgent threat to public safety, we are suspending application playbacks from the Play Store until these issues are resolved. “
The news followed the permanent suspension of Trump’s Twitter account, which had 88 million followers, on Twitter, about what he said was the incitement of the president to violence related to the assault on the Capitol building, which led to five deaths. Trump later condemned the violence. Trump has also been banned from Facebook and Instagram.
Gab, a Parler-like social network known for its far-right user base and frequent series of hate speech, seems to be having consequences. On Monday, Gab CEO Andrew Torba announced that the platform has gained 600,000 new users.
– Additional reporting by Annie Palmer and Natasha Turak of CNBC.