Facebook blocks the account of the woman who launched the ‘#ImNotAfraidToSayIt’ movement

Facebook has suspended the account of the Ukrainian civic activist Anastasiya Melnychenko, who recently launched the “#ImNotAfraidToSayIt” campaign to get people in Ukraine and Russia talking openly about incidents where they were targeted by sexual, physical, or psychological violence. 

“[Facebook administrators] sent me a notification yesterday, saying that I’d supposedly posted something that doesn’t comply with Facebook’s rules. And then it turned out that my account had been suspended temporarily, to check to make sure it’s not fake,” Melnychenko told Meduza.

Melnychenko suspects that Facebook administrators received a coordinated flood of complaints about her account. “It’s clear that this is connected to the flashmob,” she said. “It’s just that Facebook is my personal mass-media outlet. I use it to communicate with the world, and so I’m in a state of mild panic right now.”