Facebook stood by their claim that a technical glitch was the reason why a Facebook Live video of Philando Castile, a 32-year-old Minnesota man, bleeding after being shot by police was briefly removed. In a call with Gizmodo, the company denied a report that a police officer was responsible for the video being removed.
The video of Castile dying, filmed by his girlfriend, quickly went viral. Then, the video was mysteriously removed. An hour later, Facebook restored it, citing a technical glitch. Since then, the video has sparked national outrage over police treatment of minorities.
Facebook declined to elaborate on how a technical glitch caused the video to be removed, calling it complicated.
Blaming the video’s removal on technology is a notable change from previous instances, like the removal of a widely shared post displaying solidarity in the wake of the Orlando shooting, when Facebook said the posts were removed “in error” by its content moderation team.
Mark Zuckerberg discussed the video in a post last night but didn’t address why it disappeared from Facebook: