A Facebook account was hacked to spread religious slur that ignited violence leaving four people dead and over 100 others injured in Bhola’s Borhanuddin Upazila on Sunday, police say.
Published : 20 Oct 2019, 05:53 PM
At the heart of the trouble is Biplob Chandra Shuvo whose account was used by a hacker to spread profanity-laced comments, according to Superintendent of Police Sarker Mohammad Kaiser.
Shuvo went to Borhanuddin Police Station on Friday night to file a general diary after he discovered that his Facebook account was breached. The man is still in police custody for security reasons.
The hacker accessed Shuvo’s Facebook Messenger and published a screenshot of slanderous comments on social media. That sparked a firestorm of protests online and offline.
Police arrested two people with alleged links to the hacking and informed the public about the development on Saturday night after demonstrations were held in the morning.
The law enforcers found conversations on Shuvo’s Messenger account in which the hacker provided a mobile phone number and demanded Tk 500 to return the account.
But the angry locals arranged a rally again on Sunday morning and attacked police when it was wrapped up early, ensuing the clashes.
Bangladesh had experienced attacks on religious minorities on allegation of insulting religion on Facebook earlier.
Fourteen temples were ransacked and more than a hundred Hindu houses looted and vandalised in Nasirnagar Upazila of Brahmanbarhia in 2016 over an alleged Facebook post insulting Islam.
Investigation revealed later that the man accused of uploading the post was actually innocent.
The next year, one person was killed and several others injured as police opened fire on locals who torched a number of Hindu homes in Rangpur in protest against an allegedly blasphemous Facebook post.
A group of radical Islamists carried out arson attacks and looted at dozens of Buddhist temples homes at Ramu in Cox’s Bazar in a similar incident in 2012.