For the past several months, a coordinated digital campaign has targeted community archivists in Bangladesh who document and preserve audiovisual material related to the July 2024 Student-People’s Mass Uprising, including its history, collective memory, and records of human rights violations.
These attacks systematically exploit weaknesses in Meta’s copyright enforcement mechanisms, with the primary objective of removing Facebook pages that host critical documentation of the movement. Despite repeated appeals to Meta by affected community archivists, the responses have been limited and largely ineffective.
We spoke with at least three young documentarians through messaging platforms and phone calls. They confirmed that their Facebook pages functioned as informal but highly significant digital archives of this historical moment. A substantial portion of this content is already being used as evidentiary material in proceedings at the Bangladesh International Crimes Tribunal addressing mass violence linked to the July 2024 uprising.
When copyright strikes are submitted using fake email identities and fabricated claims, Meta removes videos and images without adequate verification or due process. For many self-organized archivist communities, Facebook has served as their primary platform for public engagement and memory preservation. As a result of Meta’s failure to ensure adequate safeguards, critical documentation is being lost, directly affecting broader transitional...
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