At issue:  Russian interference in E.U. referendum

It’s gotten a lot of media play:  U.S. intelligence agencies have publicly reported that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered actions to interfere with the Presidential election in 2016, including social media. Facebook and Twitter have reported that their own internal investigations show its online platforms were used by Russian operatives in an attempt to influence the election.

What hasn’t been reported as widely here in the U.S. is the United Kingdom investigation into similar Russian actions, again using social media, in the European Union referendum.  U.K. officials have been demanding answers from the social media companies and they aren’t happy with the answers (or lack thereof).

Now, the language coming from U.K. officials is getting tougher, including threatening sanctions against Facebook and Twitter.  “If you ignore requests to act, if you fail to police the site effectively and deal with highly problematic content,” said Damian Collins, chair of the Department of Culture, Media, and Sport select committee responding to The Guardian, “then there has to be some sort of sanction against you.”

Earlier, Collins had told Twitter in a formal letter that “the information you have now shared with us is completely inadequate.”