By DANIELA MAURICIO
Bulatlat.com

MANILA – A coalition of progressive partylist groups raised concerns over a series of cyberattacks targeting some members of their senatorial slate eight months before the 2025 midterm elections, suspecting a coordinated effort to weaken their online reach.

“These are coordinated attacks meant to disable the online presence of Makabayan and its supporters, even before the election period has begun,” the Makabayan coalition stated in a Facebook post.

Last week, social media platforms Facebook and X suspended the accounts of peasant leader Danilo Ramos, fisherfolk leader Ka Ronnel Arambulo, Bayan Muna Mindanao, and Bagong Alyansang Makabayan (Bayan).

Their accounts were reportedly taken down for “violating community standards” on multiple platforms, including Facebook, X, and Instagram.

Cyber-attacks ahead of an election are not new, said the group, highlighting how progressives faced similar account suspension while media outfits were subjected to distributed denial of service attacks during the 2022 elections.

Back then, Bayan Muna filed House Resolution 2493 that called for an investigation into the cyberattacks targeting these media organizations.

“This development goes against the very principles of freedom of expression and association,” Makabayan said.

Meanwhile, cultural workers’ group Artista ng Rebolusyong Pangkultura (ARPAK) also denounced the cyberattacks targeting Makabayan candidates in a post on X, calling it a “coordinated censorship” designed to prevent marginalized communities from running for senate. “This development reeks of a fascistic strategy meant to prevent the Filipino people from organizing and mobilizing themselves to wrestle power from an elite few who serve only their own US imperialist-aligned interests.”

In line with this, the Makabayan Coalition said in their statement that “[T]his may be a preview of things to come during the actual election period. Freedom of expression advocates must be alerted and must collectively stand against these online attacks.”

“We are working to restore access to these attacks as we sound alarm over intensifying attacks meant to silence progressive and alternative voices in what is generally an elite-dominated political system.” they concluded. (JJE, DAA)

Disclosure: Bulatlat has been the subject of distributed denial of service or DDoS attacks since 2019.