Arizona State University sued Facebook in federal court late Thursday in an effort to take down an Instagram account promoting “coronavirus parties” supposedly happening on campus.
Facebook ultimately removed the account from Instagram on Friday along with several others that had been posting similar content on the platform in recent weeks.
Filed by attorneys for ASU’s board of regents, the lawsuit claims the “asu_covid.parties” account infringes on the school’s trademarks in addition to violating Instagram’s rules.
ASU said it believes the account is based in Russia, too, and that its owners could be trying to “sow confusion and conflict” while also worsening the novel coronavirus pandemic.
The account began posting on Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, on July 19, and is currently followed by more than 900 other accounts.
“THROWING HUGE PARTIES AT ASU,” reads part of the profile’s description.
In its first post, the account shared an image showing ASU’s logo above a message in the school’s colors, reading: “No more social distancing. No more masks. It is time to party!”
The account has posted more than 20 more times on the platform in the following weeks, including one claiming it will host a coronavirus party at ASU this Saturday.
Several of the posts contain medical misinformation about COVID-19, the disease the coronavirus causes, such as falsely claiming that masks do not help mitigate the pandemic.
Other posts describe COVID-19 as “a fat hoax,” while a number are making connections between mitigation efforts and Nazi Germany.
“We don’t think COVID itself was a hoax. We believe the idea that COVID was especially bad in the United States is a hoax,” reads one of the account’s posts.
“Masks and restrictions don’t work,” reads another. “Wake up, people.”
ASU’s lawyers said they asked Instagram earlier this month to take down the account but were unsuccessful and accordingly asked the U.S. District Court in Arizona to intervene.
ASU’s lawyers said they asked Instagram earlier this month to take down the account but were unsuccessful and accordingly asking the U.S. District Court in Arizona to intervene.
“This unauthorized use of ASU’s trademarks and trade dress not only harms ASU, but if not enjoined is also likely to endanger the health of the university community. There is already evidence of at least one instance of actual confusion regarding ASU’s affiliation with this Instagram account, with an alumnus threatening to cut off all support for ASU because of the apparent misperception that this account and its messaging comes from or has been sanctioned by ASU,” the school’s lawyers wrote.
Instagram’s policies also state the platform will “remove content that has the potential to contribute to real-world harm,” the lawsuit notes.
“Further worsening this situation, the initial investigation indicates that the parties behind this account may be located in Russia and are using the account to sow confusion and conflict and to interfere with the health of the Arizona State University community by trying to worsen the pandemic here,” ASU’s lawyers added without elaborating. “This lawsuit is also necessary in part to discover the true identity of the parties behind this account.”
Facebook told The Times on Friday that it had removed the ASU account on six others that had been promoting supposed “COVID parties” in the U.S. and abroad.
“We have removed the account in question for violating our policies,” a Facebook spokesperson told The Times. “We disagree that the account infringes any trademark rights ASU might have.”
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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