Twitter allowed FBI to become ‘belly button’ for intelligence agency demands to ban accounts

The latest Twitter documents revealed that the CIA sent out warnings about a book that claims Joe and Hunter Biden committed acts of corruption in Ukraine.

After a breakdown of what led to Twitter’s cooperation with the FBI, journalist Matt Taibbi’s latest Twitter file dump detailed how that partnership allowed the agency to become the “belly button” for filtering government demands.

Among those demands was a message from the CIA warning about a new book by former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin, which contained allegations of corruption by the US government, specifically, by the Bidens.

“We assess with great confidence that in the summer of 2020 members of a Russian-influenced organization, which is at least partially run by Russian intelligence, were aware of a production plan associated with an upcoming book,” the message read.

“While it is unclear at this time how involved Russian intelligence might be in the creation or promotion of this book, it is known that they directed this same influence organization to propagate similar information in previous operations.”

In ‘True Stories of Joe Biden’s International Corruption in Ukraine’, ousted former Ukrainian prosecutor Viktor Shokin reiterated claims of alleged wrongdoing by the Bidens.

It’s unclear if Twitter took any action against the book, and Shokin’s claims were debunked amid intense scrutiny over the Bidens’ alleged conflict of interest.

It is unclear if Twitter took any action against the book “True Stories of Joe Biden’s International Corruption in Ukraine.”

Shokin was Ukraine’s top prosecutor from 2015 to 2016 before being fired for allegedly turning a blind eye to corruption.

His book reiterates his claims that Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company where Hunter Biden was a board member, paid Hunter millions of dollars to prevent prosecutors from cracking down on corruption at the company.

Furthermore, he alleged that Joe Biden himself had ordered Shokin’s dismissal before he could solve the case, however reports revealed that Hunter was never involved in any investigation.

Although Hunter’s role with Burisma raised concerns about a conflict of interest at the time, the corruption allegations have since been debunked despite claims to the contrary by Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who allegedly admitted earlier this year he failed to dig up any dirt on the Bidens.

The new Twitter files also revealed that the social media company had a falling out with the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC) in February 2020.

According to internal memos, the fledgling intelligence agency noted that Russian and Chinese misinformation about the coronavirus was being spread.

The GEC singled out the accounts as “Russian individuals and representatives” who “described the coronavirus as an engineered bioweapon,” blamed “research conducted at the Wuhan institute,” and “attributed the emergence of the virus to the CIA.”

As Twitter tried to crack down on who had access to former Trust and Safety chief Yoel Roth, who was busy coordinating requests from intelligence agencies, the GEC decided to go public with its own findings on disinformation.

Along with a list of 5,500 accounts that GEC says would “amplify Chinese propaganda and misinformation” about COVID, the agency released a list of nearly 250,000 of those accounts to the public, much to the dismay of Twitter.

“Roth viewed the GEC move as an attempt by GEC to use information from other agencies to ‘insert’ into the content moderation club that included Twitter, Facebook, the FBI, DHS and others,” Taibbi wrote.

The Twitter files also showed former security chief Yoel Roth (above) tried to undermine the Trump administration agency by pointing out misinformation.

Internal memos show the FBI’s willingness to serve as a funnel for intelligence agencies.

The FBI would essentially function as the “belly button” for relaying requests between intelligence agencies and social media companies.

After the fallout, Twitter documents show the FBI warned the company that GEC wanted to be on the industry calls between social media and intelligence leaders.

Roth, however, seemed hesitant to allow the GEC to join because the agency, operated under the Trump administration at the time, was too political, unlike the FBI and Department of Homeland Security, which Roth called “apolitical” in a May 6, 2020 Email.

“I think they thought the FBI was less Trumpy,” a former Defense Department official told Taibbi.

Roth also suggested in an email the following month that bringing the GEC to the table would pose “significant risks” as the 2020 election heats up.

As the GEC and other agencies tried to offer more information, the FBI stepped in and offered to serve as “conduits” for the rest of the intelligence agencies.