Patreon will now remove creator accounts that 'advance disinformation' and promote the QAnon conspiracy theory. Patreon is a platform that provides business tools for content creators.

“Going forward, creator accounts that advance disinformation promoting the QAnon conspiracy theory will no longer be supported on Patreon,” the platform announced in a blog post earlier this week.

Patreon further said the decision has been taken as there are a small number of creators on the platform who have supported the QAnon conspiracy theory with their work.

“Because of this, and the fact that we have seen a number of other online platforms overrun with pages and groups actively focused around QAnon disinformation, we are taking action. In an effort to assess and combat this growing threat, Patreon’s Policy and Trust & Safety teams have individually identified the creator accounts that have engaged in spreading QAnon-supporting disinformation,” Patreon said.

Moving forward, QAnon-dedicated accounts advancing disinformation and propagating QAnon content that is identified by Patreon’s Policy and Trust & Safety teams, will be removed from the platform.

“Creators who have propagated some QAnon content, but are not dedicated to spreading QAnon disinformation, will have the opportunity to bring their campaigns into compliance with our updated guidelines,” Patreon said.

“Creators whose campaigns seek to analyse the QAnon conspiracy theory will not be impacted by this policy change. To date, the majority of creator accounts discussing QAnon fall into this last category,” it added.

The platform will reach out to these three types of creators to provide information related to its updated guidelines, it said.

QAnon is a far-right-wing conspiracy theory movement. Multiple online platforms have taken various steps to limit QAnon content as the movement has had harmful consequences in the past.

Facebook has completely banned QAnon content, labelling it a militarised movement. The social media giant in August had said that it had expanded its Dangerous Individuals and Organisations policy to address QAnon activity on its platform. It will now remove all Facebook Pages, Groups and Instagram accounts related to QAnon.

Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn have also taken steps to limit the spread of misinformation related to QAnon.

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