Twitter has criticised the UK Conservative Party for rebranding one of their accounts as a fake factchecking service during last night's general election leaders' debate.
The British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn faced off in the ITV debate, clashing over issues such as Brexit and the NHS.
During the debate, the Conservative press office account - CCHQ Press - renamed and rebranded their verified account as 'FactCheckUK', posting pro-Johnson and anti-Corbyn tweets throughout the evening.
FACT: The US President has confirmed that the NHS would not be on the table in trade negotiations#LeadersDebate pic.twitter.com/G2i1eOqEKg
— CCHQ Press (@CCHQPress) November 19, 2019
As of Wednesday morning the account had reverted back to the CCHQ name and branding.
The independent UK factchecking group Full Fact was among those who criticised the Tories for the move - describing it as "inappropriate and misleading".
It is inappropriate and misleading for the Conservative press office to rename their twitter account ‘factcheckUK’ during this debate. Please do not mistake it for an independent fact checking service such as @FullFact, @FactCheck or @FactCheckNI
— Full Fact (@FullFact) November 19, 2019
In a statement quoted by BBC, meanwhile, Twitter said any similar efforts in the future would be met with "decisive corrective action".
A company spokesperson said: "Twitter is committed to facilitating healthy debate throughout the UK general election.
"We have global rules in place that prohibit behaviour that can mislead people, including those with verified accounts.
"Any further attempts to mislead people by editing verified profile information - in a manner seen during the UK Election Debate - will result in decisive corrective action."
The Conservative chairman James Cleverly was questioned about by BBC Newsnight's Emily Maitlis about the issue, with the presenter accusing the party of a 'dystopian' effort to 'dress up party lines as a fact-check service'.
Mr Cleverly defended the move, arguing: "The Twitter handle of the CCHQ press office remained CCHQ Press - so it's clear the nature of the site.
"The reason we did is because we were calling out the inaccuracies, the lies that were coming out during the debate."
