The Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan were using PayPal to collect donations that would go towards payments for the postage of newsletters and other materials to its supporters, as well as to organize public rallies. They were promoting the account via a donation page on their website. They said that by helping with money, the people that couldn’t get involved in events could still partake in the cause by contributing to the fund.
This was picked up on by an anti-bigotry campaigner and announced on Twitter. The activist flagged the issue and urged it to be blocked by PayPal. Eventually, PayPal did suspend the account but it took the company 6 days. This, of course, raised concerns and the US-based firm faces criticism for not resolving the issue more rapidly.
Oh cool you can donate to the KKK with @PayPal.@AskPayPal can you explain this? pic.twitter.com/bkEzSlM3p2
— Nandini Jammi (@nandoodles) August 24, 2019
It was brought to their attention that their pledge to “evaluate all sites” was questionable if it was possible for the KKK to fund its services through the platform without being noticed. People worry there could be other organizations advocating racist views going unnoticed.
Nandini Jammi, from the internet-based group Sleeping Giants, told BBC News:
I have tons of concerns that PayPal is not able to act quickly and decisively on hate groups. There are some examples of them acting in a fairly timely manner. But they’re not applying [their anti-hate policy] in a consistent enough manner.
A spokesman for PayPal said:
Due to our legal and data protection obligations, we cannot comment on any specific PayPal customer’s account. We carefully review accounts to ensure our services are used in line with our acceptable use policy and take action as appropriate. We do not allow PayPal services to be used to promote hate, violence, or other forms of intolerance that are discriminatory.
The page now features a notice saying the recipient is “currently unable to receive money”. Nevertheless, Ms. Jammi said she found it to be “alarmingly common” for white nationalist groups and personalities to raise funds via a range of legitimate online payment and advertising platforms. “I’ve been tracking hate groups on PayPal for several months now,” she said. “I was just Googling for a new example and I kind of knew all I had to do was type in KKK.”
A Gmail account was registered to the PayPal profile involved, which has led some people to question if Google also planned to intervene. Apparently, a Google spokeswoman said it was looking into the matter.
https://twitter.com/RzstProgramming/status/1165307175033626625?s=20
In the end, the people were glad action was taken but they’re still uneasy about the fact that PayPal didn’t even notice without it being brought to their attention. Sleeping Giants tweeted:
Good that @PayPal suspended the KKK’s account, but pretty crazy that a volunteer campaign on social media needs to do this job for companies making hundreds of millions of dollars.
Good that @PayPal suspended the KKK’s account, but pretty crazy that a volunteer campaign on social media needs to do this job for companies making hundreds of millions of dollars.
We’ll keep going, though.https://t.co/o02wueB6R9
— Sleeping Giants (@slpng_giants) September 2, 2019
