Parler, a social media app popular with conservatives and supporters of President Donald Trump, has gone offline after Amazon withdrew its support in the wake of the deadly uprising at the Capitol last week.
The app relied on cloud computing power from Amazon Web Services.
AWS told Parler Saturday that it will no longer provide cloud services to the company starting Sunday at 11:59 p.m. PT, according to an email obtained by CNBC. An Amazon spokesperson confirmed the letter’s authenticity to CNBC, but declined to comment further.
John Matze, the founder and CEO, said in a statement Monday that the Parler app will be out “longer than expected” because other cloud hosting companies do not want to partner with Parler in light of press statements from Amazon, Google and Apple.
“We will probably be out longer than expected,” Matze wrote. “This is not due to software limitations – we have our software and everyone’s data ready to use. Rather, Amazon, Google and Apple’s statements to the press about our access being discontinued have resulted in most of our our other suppliers have discontinued their support for us because well. “
He added, “Most people with enough servers to host us have closed their doors to us. We will update everyone and update the press when we get back online.”
AWS told Parler in the email that it had reported to Parler 98 examples of messages that “clearly incite and incite violence.” Among the messages it reported to Parler that were viewed by CNBC, users on the platform made violent threats directed against “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 tech giants’ movements in a series of posts on Parler over the weekend, alleging that his platform had removed the violent content and added that community guidelines do not allow Parler to be knowingly used for criminal activity.
“We are the worlds [sic] last hope for free speech and free information. What they are doing is unprecedented, groundless and absolutely disgusting, “Matze wrote late Saturday night.” They want to maintain their monopoly on speech. “
In response, an AWS spokesperson told CNBC that AWS provides services to customers across the political spectrum, confirming that the suspension was for content that the company said clearly encouraged violence.
Apple removed Parler from the iPhone App Store on Saturday. The company said reports on Parler about the Capitol riot last week included calls for violence, which violates Apple’s rules against offensive content.
“We’ve always supported different views represented in 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 adequate measures to address the spread of these threats to human security. We have suspended Parler from the App Store until they fix these issues.”
Google removed Parler from its Android app store, Google Play, on Friday.
“To protect user safety on Google Play, our long-standing policy requires that apps displaying user-generated content have moderation policies and enforcement that removes blatant content, such as messages that incite violence,” said a Google spokesperson.
“All developers agree to these terms and we have reminded Parler of this clear policy in recent months. We are aware that there are ongoing posts in the Parler app that incite continued violence in the US. We recognize that there are There can be reasonable debate about content and that it can be difficult for apps to remove all violent content immediately, but if we want to distribute an app through Google Play, we do require apps to implement robust moderation for blatant content. ongoing and urgent public safety threat, we will suspend the app’s listings in the Play Store until these issues are resolved. “
The news follows Twitter’s permanent suspension of Trump’s Twitter account, which had 88 million followers, on what was said to be inciting violence by the president in connection with the storming of the Capitol, which resulted in five deaths. Trump later condemned the violence. Trump has also been banned from Facebook and Instagram.
Gab, a social network similar to Parler known for its far-right user base and a frequent host of hate speech, appears to be benefiting from the consequences. On Monday, Gab CEO Andrew Torba announced that the platform had gained 600,000 new users.
– Additional reporting by CNBC’s Annie Palmer and Natasha Turak.