“The Spanish border is open, you can cross without papers”. Most of the testimonies collected from the Tarajal sands, right after crossing the border, pointed to social networks as a key vector of the greatest migrant crisis our country has ever experienced.
The idea that the border was open, or that it would suffice to swim across to avoid being stopped, reached the screens of more than 70,000 people who threw themselves into the sea in front of the breakwater long before the major media and television outlets. It also reached the screens of the 88 who died along the way, whose families are now looking in groups that later appeared in newspapers, making AI-generated posters in Spanish and Dariya.
WhatsApp and Facebook, both owned by the tech giant Meta, were the main channels through which the message spread. In the case of Facebook, with more than 30 million users in the neighboring country, today we know that the network of groups through which the call went viral amounted to as many as 400,000 members.
How the call to cross into Ceuta circulated
The call to cross the border spread through false or misleading information and dangerous instructions that put lives at risk (“here it covers less”, “if you can’t swim, they sell inflatables”). In addition, the pages and groups on this social network led to private WhatsApp groups, a service owned by the same company. However, after the tragedy, the American tech company discreetly suspended some of them without offering substantial explanations, and did so without handing over data to authorities, erasing traces.
“The discussion about the responsibility of the platforms themselves has escaped public debate, fueling a dangerous culture of impunity that benefits their business model”
Since that day, the speculations about the origin and authenticity of these groups, the traces of bot networks operating from abroad, or the investigations into tangled conspiracy theories have only grown; as quickly as the uneasy anticipation ahead of new calls, starting with August 15. And, conversely, the discussion about the responsibility of the platforms themselves has escaped public debate, fueling a dangerous culture of impunity that benefits their business model.
During the crisis, companies like Meta, which profit from dominating markets and services almost entirely in Spain and Morocco, were key pieces in at least four major issues. First, the spread of false and unsafe information about crossing Tarajal, for which the platform would not have seen a need for moderation or context, risking lives. Second, the exposure of thousands of users to the interference of networks of anonymous accounts whose interests are unclear and whose group suspensions hinder clarification. Third, the algorithmic amplification of disinformation and conspiracy theories after the crisis erupted, especially on X and YouTube. And fourth, but no less serious, the fraud attempts aimed particularly at the families of victims and missing persons, from which anonymous accounts would have tried to profit by offering information in exchange for money.
When we talk about these matters, as misinformation expert Marcelino Madrigal notes, “the primary responsibility lies with Facebook, the largest platform in Morocco, and with the messaging apps that allow these groups to organize.” Meta holds a virtual monopoly over instant messaging services in both countries through WhatsApp, which more than two-thirds of the citizens of both countries have installed on their phones. If there is only one factory in the river, who filled it with pollutants through their recklessness, indifference, or irresponsibility?
People who migrate in search of a better life use social networks as a compass. In our own country, hundreds of Spanish migrants create viral content for those who stay behind, guiding them on how to go work in mines or plantations in Australia where they can “make a fortune” in exchange for working under conditions we wouldn’t accept here. In Morocco, where hundreds of young people are willing to risk their lives, not only to distance themselves from their loved ones, this compass takes the form of Facebook groups like “Castillejos 🏊 🇪🇸 Ceuta,” which at one point had more than 177,000 followers.
In the groups that framed the motive for thousands of people to swim across the border, there accumulated supposed reports from the border, Google Maps screenshots indicating swimming distances, and misleading or false information to avoid detention (for example, that “they won’t deport those who have jobs” or “if you enter by sea you can’t be expelled from the country”). But there were also ads for fins published from the far side of the country and sales of second-hand wetsuits.
As I review the posts, I cannot help asking: why would someone in Casablanca, 439 km away, find the opportunity to put their fins up for sale, while neither Facebook nor the authorities could find a chance to moderate —or provide context to— those contents? Just as some local media had reported a day or two earlier about a possible mass crossing and the major outlets did not, the platforms did not act preventively.
“La cobertura mediática de estos grupos oscila entre dos extremos: los que hablan de un fenómeno espontáneo y los que anticipan la revelación de tupidos entramados de manipulación digital desde el extranjero”
Media coverage of these groups oscillates between two extremes: those who describe it as a spontaneous phenomenon and those who anticipate the unveiling of dense networks of digital manipulation from abroad. The reality is always more complex. Indeed, the moderation of the groups often falls to accounts that rely on operational security schemes, the opposite of spontaneous behavior. The page names change, many key profiles are fake or empty, the links are always posted in the comments section and various user networks intervene in the conversations to connect these groups to others on WhatsApp, where scrutiny is harder.
There are many —perhaps several— motivations behind these networks, even if they do not always dominate the conversation on these pages. Some may be Migrant diaspora groups aiming to help others migrate on their own hands while trying to avoid account suspensions, but there may also be interference by intelligence services, such as the Moroccan DGST, either to condition flows or to monitor those conversations. Yet the ultimate responsibility for doing so lies with the providers of those services and with the States. Whether we speak of the interference of these networks or the risks of what we call “spontaneous” conversation: the conversation promoted by algorithms based on interaction and virality, which is not free of biases.
That the Moroccan state had the capacity to monitor the situation on networks to prevent thousands from putting themselves at risk is a claim hard to dispute. The massive crossing occurred less than a year after the Moroccan state managed to repress a wave of protests by the “Generation Z,” whose mobilization strategies relied precisely on these messaging apps and large groups on platforms like Discord.
When it came to dismantling democratic movements such as “Genz 121” —which was organized precisely in massive servers with more than 200,000 users— the Moroccan regime did not seem to have trouble monitoring digital conversation, identifying risks and acting accordingly. In the case of Spain, whose government has promised to confront the “oligarchs” of techno-feudalism in opposition to a global trend toward servitude, we must ask whether the problem lies with the available means, the strategy, or the balance of power.
Regulating platforms when misinformation puts lives at risk
However, as far as platforms are concerned, the problem runs even deeper. Just as algorithms that teach a teenager about self-harm, self-hate, or encouragement to take one’s own life are built on an unsafe and harmful business model, those that push minors to throw themselves into the sea “where it covers the least” also gamble with their lives for money.
“They do so at the expense of the most vulnerable, allowing the networks we use daily to put at risk those seeking a better future or those who have gone days without any word from their loved ones”
They do so at the expense of the whole country, which in the hardest moments —a border crisis, the largest fire in recent history— does not find in platforms the solutions and tools to warn of risks, to dampen misinformation, but an aggravation of its problems.
When we talk about regulating digital services, we are not only talking about preventing these problems, but about building a relationship with technology that reverses the situation. Because the obstacles that kept thousands of people from receiving real information about the border situation or the risk they were taking with their lives were not technological, but business and political. That is why technology has to put life at the center, and not the profits of a few, especially not in a deadly episode that claimed the lives of 88 people.
