Gab.com, the free speech friendly social network, says traffic has increased by more than 750 percent in the past few days, following the blacklisting of President Donald Trump from most mainstream tech platforms.
“Our traffic is up 753% in the past 24 hours. Tens of millions of visits,” said Gab in response to a question about slow loading speeds.
The free speech network announced that it would bring ten new servers online to handle the increased traffic volume.
Gab was the first free speech alternative to Twitter. It takes a hardline stance on freedom of speech, allowing all legal content except pornography. Users are allowed to control their own experience on the platform through the creation of custom word filters and blocks.
Gab takes an equally hardline stance on illegal content and threats of violence, encouraging users to proactively report such content for removal.
Despite this longstanding policy, both Apple and Google have, for years banned the Gab app from their app stores, a fate which has also befallen Parler.
We have tens of thousands of volunteer users who monitor the site for threats and illegal activity. They escalate it to us and if necessary, we escalate it to law enforcement. Our moderation is decentralized via Gab groups, which are moderated by users themselves.
— Gab.com (@getongab) January 9, 2021
Launched in May 2017, Gab has faced attempted censorship and suppression from multiple quarters, leading to innovative approaches to circumvent it.
To avoid censorship by cloud hosting companies, Gab maintains its own physical servers. Gab is also in the process of developing the Gab phone, to circumvent app store censorship.
Meet the Gab Phone.
Yes, it’s real.
We’re running @GrapheneOS on a Pixel 4a.
It’s Android minus everything and anything Google with added security and privacy features. pic.twitter.com/FuSBjlNMLI
— Gab.com (@getongab) January 10, 2021
Gab also developed Dissenter, a browser extension that adds a comments section to every website on the internet. When mainstream browsers like Chrome and Mozilla Firefox banned the extension, Gab launched its own web browser, also called Dissenter.
In response to the surge in traffic, Gab founder and CEO Andrew Torba gave a concise comment to Breitbart News:
“Checkmate, Silicon Valley.”
Allum Bokhari is the senior technology correspondent at Breitbart News. His new book, #DELETED: Big Tech’s Battle to Erase the Trump Movement and Steal The Election, which contains exclusive interviews with sources inside Google, Facebook, and other tech companies, is currently available for purchase.
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