"If they censor us there, we'll find another way to speak out"

For the past few months, Big Tech has been waging a public, if not highly effective, battle against the scourge of Fake News, with platforms like Facebook and YouTube taking aim at content promoting conspiracy theories, from the silly (Flat Earth) to the more menacing (QAnon).

Now, following a handful of measles outbreaks across the country and pressure from national lawmakers, tech platforms are taking aim at another fringe group: anti-vaxxers, or people who refuse to or delay vaccinating their children. A relatively small yet vocal community, anti-vaxxers promote a wide range of views, from the theory that vaccines contain dangerously high levels of toxins to the belief that vaccines can cause autism. Such theories have been debunked time and again by most researchers, and the overwhelming scientific consensus is that vaccines save lives and potential side effects are both rare and minimal. But that hasn't stopped some skeptical parents from delaying vaccinating their children or opting out of doing so altogether, and from taking to social media to propagate conspiracy theories about Big Pharma and the government.

Unsurprisingly, anti-vaxxers aren't happy with the changes on social media, crying censorship and accusing private companies of allowing themselves to be swayed by governmental interests. But it's also unclear whether tech platforms' efforts to silence anti-vaxxers will actually work — or if they'll inadvertently turn the volume up louder.

Earlier this month, Facebook announced that it would be removing anti-vaxx groups from ads and recommendations, as well as making it more difficult for users to find anti-vaxx pages and posts using the search tool. Instagram would also stop recommending scientifically inaccurate information about vaccines on its Explore and hashtag pages. (Facebook owns Instagram.) This policy change was preceded by a BuzzFeed report that YouTube had pledged to demonetize all anti-vaxx content (when reached for comment, a YouTube spokesperson told Rolling Stone that this policy has actually been in effect for a while, and that anti-vaccine content has always fallen under its harmful or dangerous content advertising policy).