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Source: LOIC VENANCE / Getty

The verdict is still out whether or not if the Russians successfully tipped the election in favor of the mad tangerine faux dictator but if you asked us we would all say yes. Facebook believes the latter but according to a New York Times report it’s social media platform was Russia’s favorite weapon to use to disrupt our democratic voting system.

They also loved to use our favorite photo-sharing platform Instagram as well.

This past Friday, the Justice Department revealed that the Russians heavily relied on both social platforms to do their work and help get Donald Trump elected by spreading propaganda. The Russian troll farm called the Internet Research Agency started gathering information on Americans in social groups that focused on immigration and religion back in 2014. In 2015  they started purchasing ads to get the jig in motion. In 2016 they used those followers to organize rallies and help spread their false words across America.

All of this has come to light after prosecutors have charged 13 Russians and 3 companies for meddling in our election and trying to help Donald Trump who flat out denied in instances and still fails to this day to even say they did. The 37-page indictment drops the details on how Russians used stolen identities and posed as Americans, created Facebook groups and shared divisive ads and inflammatory photos to help divide the electorate.

Facebook was not accused of any wrongdoing in the indictment but it showed they were the clear favorite as the social media platform was mentioned 41 times compared to Twitter being mentioned only 9 times, YouTube once and PayPal 11 times. Facebook has more than 2 billion users on its social network so it would make sense for the Russians focus all of its efforts on the platform. Facebook is still struggling to take full responsibility for making it so easy for these egregious actions to happen and now acting swiftly to point them out. With the midterm elections quickly coming up we can only hope they do a better job of preventing this from happening again.

Photo: LOIC VENANCE/AFP/Getty Images