© Reuters / Lucas Jackson
Saudi activist Manal al-Sharif
A prominent Saudi activist has quit Twitter and Facebook, accusing the social media giants of
becoming tools for despotic governments to target dissidents and rights campaigners with trolls and bots.
Saudi women's rights activist Manal al-Sharif dramatically deleted her Twitter account, which has some 300,000 followers, on stage last week at the SingularityU Nordic 'global innovation' conference. The next day she posted a
video on YouTube explaining why she shut down her account, telling viewers that Twitter has become home to "trolls, pro-government mobs and bots,"
many of which are "paid by pro-government [agents] to silence, intimidate and harass dissidents."
Calling for a more ethical social media, Al-Sharif said that "the same tools we joined for our liberation are being used to oppress us and undermine us, and used to spread fake news and hate, I'm out of these platforms."
Al-Sharif left Saudi Arabia many years ago in a self-imposed exile, and helped start women's fight for the right to drive in Saudi Arabia in 2011. Saudi women won the right to drive in June this year.
Although Riyadh is trying to foster a more progressive image, the traditionally conservative nation
recently introduced laws that see those who post or share content that mocks or attacks religion on social media jailed for up to five years.
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