shadow ban

American  

[shad-oh ban] / ˈʃæd oʊ ˌbæn /

Or shadowban

noun

Digital Technology.

1. the suppressing from public view of a social media post or posts by platform moderators, without notifying the user who published the content, usually in response to a violation of the platform’s terms of service.

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Other Word Forms

• shadow ban verb (used with object)
• shadow-ban verb (used with object)
• shadowban verb (used with object)

Etymology

Origin of shadow ban

First recorded in 2015–20

Example Sentences

Tran’s partner, Siege Gary, is also a comic and their support, love and encouragement helped Tran keep posting regularly throughout the pandemic and not get put off by social media’s tendency to overly censor trans and queer creators and covertly “shadow ban” her posts if — no when — we get reported by right-wing and/or religious trolls; a shadow ban massively restricts how many views our posts might get.

From Los Angeles Times

Margarita Simonyan, the editor in chief of the Russian government-backed broadcaster RT, called for Musk to remove the “shadow ban” from her account and appealed to his stated commitments to “free speech.”

From Washington Post

In April, he was speculating about a “shadow ban council” suppressing a tweet insulting Bill Gates, and shadowbanning is the purest expression of limiting reach: you can see your pretty outrageous tweet, but other people don’t have to.

From The Verge

The law will require large social media companies to publish standards on how it decides to “censor, deplatform, and shadow ban.”

From Seattle Times

Users must be allowed to opt out of shadow banning, and platforms can’t shadow ban political candidates or news websites.

From The Verge