QAnon apps removed from Google Play Store for violating terms of service.
6Google has removed multiple apps in its store that were promoting the QAnon conspiracy theory (and making the company money), months after Media Matters reported on the apps and their violation of the company's policies.
The apps -- “QMAP,” “Q Alerts!,” and “Q Alerts LITE” -- would show posts from “Q,” the central figure in the conspiracy theory that has been linked to multiple threatening and violent acts, including murders and attempted kidnappings. An FBI field office last year released a memo that listed QAnon as a potential domestic terrorism threat.
None of those apps are now listed in Google Play.
In a statement to Media Matters, a Google spokesperson confirmed the company had removed the apps, saying, “When we find apps that violate Play policy by distributing misleading or harmful information, we remove them from the store.” Media Matters sent a request to Google for comment on the QAnon apps in late March but did not receive a response, nor were the apps removed at that time.
The apps’ removal comes months after Media Matters reported in early February about their existence and that Google allowed them even though it prohibits apps with “content related to terrorism, such as content that promotes terrorist acts, incites violence, or celebrates terrorist attacks.” The report also noted that Google profited off of them, as several cost money to download.
https://www.mediamatters.org/qanon-conspiracy-theory/after-months-inaction-google-has-finally-removed-qanon-apps-violated-terms
QAnon[a] (/kjuːəˈnɒn/) is a far-right conspiracy theory[7][8] detailing a supposed secret plot by an alleged "deep state" against U.S. President Donald Trump and his supporters.[9] The theory began with an October 2017 post on the anonymous imageboard 4chan by someone using the name Q, a presumably American[10] individual, but probably later a group of people,[11][12] claiming to have access to classified information involving the Trump administration and its opponents in the United States. Q has falsely accused many liberal Hollywood actors, Democratic politicians, and high-ranking officials of engaging in an international child sex trafficking ring, and has claimed that Donald Trump feigned collusion with Russians in order to enlist Robert Mueller to join him in exposing the ring and preventing a coup d'état by Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and George Soros.[13][14][15] "Q" is a reference to the Q clearance used by the Department of Energy. QAnon believers commonly tag their social media posts with the hashtag #WWG1WGA, signifying the motto "where we go one, we go all."
The conspiracy theory, mainly disseminated by supporters of President Trump under the names The Storm and The Great Awakening—QAnon's precepts and vocabulary are closely related to the religious concepts of millenarianism and apocalypticism,[16] leading it to be sometimes construed as an emerging religious movement[17][18][19]—has been widely characterized as "baseless",[20][21][22] "unhinged",[23] and "evidence-free".[24] Its proponents have been called "a deranged conspiracy cult"[25] and "some of the Internet's most outré Trump fans".[26]
According to Travis View, who has studied the QAnon phenomenon and written about it extensively for The Washington Post, the essence of the conspiracy theory is that
there is a worldwide cabal of Satan-worshiping pedophiles who rule the world, essentially, and they control everything. They control politicians, and they control the media. They control Hollywood, and they cover up their existence, essentially. And they would have continued ruling the world, were it not for the election of President Donald Trump,[16]
who was elected to put a stop to the cabal, and whose struggles behind the scenes are being revealed by "Q".[16] "The Storm" is an anticipated event in which thousands of people, members of the cabal, will be arrested, possibly sent to Guantanamo Bay prison or face military tribunals, and the U.S. military will brutally take over the country.[16] The result will be salvation and a utopia on earth.[27]
QAnon adherents began appearing at Trump re-election campaign rallies during the summer of 2018.[28] TV and radio personality Michael "Lionel" Lebron, a promoter of the theory, was granted a photo opportunity with President Trump in the Oval Office on August 24, 2018.[29] Bill Mitchell, a broadcaster who promotes the QAnon conspiracy theory, attended a White House "social media summit" in July 2019.[8][30] Hours after a published report in August 2019 that the FBI determined QAnon to be a potential source of domestic terrorism—the first time a fringe conspiracy theory had been so rated by the agency—a man warming up the crowd before Trump spoke at a rally used the QAnon motto, "where we go one, we go all", later denying it was a QAnon reference.[31][32]