Facebook blocks posts in Thailand that the government has blacklisted

Facebook is now blocking some posts in Thailand based on what the government deems is unsavoury.

On Tuesday, journalist Andrew MacGregor Marshall noticed that some of his posts and those from fellow dissident Somsak Jeamteerasakul were not showing up for users accessing Facebook in Thailand.

This post he made appears to users outside the country, but shows up as a removed post if accessed from a Thai IP address. Mashable also used a Thai proxy server to confirm Marshall's allegation.

The post carries pictures of a woman Marshall claims is King Vajiralongkorn's mistress. In the pictures, the woman is in her underwear and seen paying respects in downtown Bangkok to the statue of the late King Chulalongkorn, who passed away in 1910.

Thailand has strict lese majeste laws forbidding anyone to speak ill of the royal family. Critics say these laws, which in the past have convicted people for merely "liking" anti-royal posts on Facebook, are used as a tool for suppressing dissidents.

Marshall, a former Bangkok-based Reuters reporter, has been banned from Thailand since 2011 and lives in Edinburgh, U.K. He told Mashable he was aware his posts are illegal in Thailand, and that he has "deliberately" broken Thai law in order to highlight censorship by the government.

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Facebook confirmed to Mashable that it does work with governments to remove posts, and is simply doing what it can to stay within the bounds of local law.

A Facebook spokesperson said the company puts each flagged post through a legal process, and that so far, 10 pieces of content have been restricted in Thailand in response to requests from the Ministry of Information and Communication Technology.

The Thai government met with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg in November last year to "discuss ways of monitoring and blocking 'inappropriate content'," DPA reported.

Facebook has restricted access to content in countries before, blocking some 55,000 pieces of content across 20 countries from July to Dec. 2015, according to The New York Times.