• Milo Yiannopoulos has revealed on Gab that his personal Coinbase account was shut down
• This comes after he, along with Alex Jones and other Alt Right celebrities, was banned from Facebook and Twitter
• The founder of Gab has also been banned from Coinbase

Last week, it was announced  that Facebook was banning the accounts of some prominent right-wing personalities and controversial characters such as Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos.  It was met with both praise and criticism from several in the industry, with some believing that this was an act of censorship while others felt that it was a bold step towards cracking down on dangerous ideologies being propagated via the internet.

Now one more company is taking step towards banning these individuals from using their platform as Coinbase, a prominent cryptocurrency exchange has banned the personal account of British right-wing journalist Milo Yiannopoulos.

His announcement featured a screenshot of his email account in which he was asked by Coinbase to verify his email in one message and minutes later, he was notified that his account had been closed, which implies that it was due to his identity being revealed.

Banning undesirable celebrities

This is not the first time that Coinbase is burning the personal account of a famous individual.  In January, Andrew Torba, who is, ironically, the founder of Gab, the platform that Yiannopoulos posted this message from, also had his account terminated. It is believed that this is because of his affiliation with the platform that has been used to allegedly spread hate speech.

Yiannopoulos has found himself banned not only from Facebook and Coinbase but Twitter as well, mostly due to his far-right positions and many controversies. Regardless of all the backlash, platforms have stated that they will continue to ban individuals that they deem unfit to use them in a bid to crack down on hate speech.

“We’ve always banned individuals or organizations that promote or engage in violence and hate, regardless of ideology. The process for evaluating potential violators is extensive and it is what led us to our decision to remove these accounts today,”  said a Facebook spokesperson to the Guardian, amidst rumors of their new token.

Censorship or protecting their brand?

Still, this entire question brings up the debate about whether or not an individual should be censored from private platforms due to their views not being compatible. While some think that private companies should be able to ban who they feel are dangerous, others think that banning individuals is an infringement on their rights to free speech.