A popular website for posts about the conspiracy group QAnon abruptly shut down after a fact-checking group identified the developer as a New Jersey man.
Qmap.pub is among the largest websites promoting the QAnon conspiracy, with over 10 million visitors in July, according to web analytics firm SimilarWeb Ltd., and served as the primary archive of QAnon’s posts.
The website aggregates posts by Q, the anonymous figure behind the QAnon theory, and the creator of the Qmap.pub website is known online only as “QAppAnon.”
The fact-checking site Logically.ai identified Jason Gelinas of New Jersey on Sept. 10 as the “developer and mouthpiece” for the site.
Reached outside his home, Gelinas declined to comment on the Logically report, saying only that someone had sent it to him on Twitter after it was published.
“I’m not going to comment on any of that,” Gelinas said when asked if he was behind the website Qmap. “I’m not going to get involved. I want to stay out of it.”
Hours after the initial contact from Bloomberg News, the website was no longer accessible.
QAnon is notable for its long list of false claims and wrong predictions, including a recent one that John F. Kennedy Jr., who died in a 1999 plane crash, was actually alive and would join Donald Trump on the Republican ticket this year.
It has been designated by the FBI as a growing national threat.
Generally speaking, the far-right movement believes that Trump is fighting a Satan-worshiping, “deep-state” cabal of pedophiles.
The idea appears to have gotten its start in 2017 on the message board 4chan, although it is not known who was responsible.
Logically’s report described Gelinas’ website as “a crucial port of call for all QAnon information and a major node in how the movement disseminates its lore,” getting visits from 10 million people a month.
The theory is similar but not related to the so-called Pizzagate theory that Hillary Clinton campaign officials were involved in a pedophile ring headquartered in the non-existent basement of a Washington, D.C., pizzeria.
A believer was sentenced to four years in prison in 2017 for showing up to the restaurant with a rifle and revolver in order to “investigate.”
A LinkedIn profile for Gelinas says he works as an information security analyst at Citigroup.
The QAnon movement, which has been likened to a cult, has gained traction among some of Trump’s most ardent supporters and a number of Republican candidates have been linked to it, including Marjorie Taylor Greene, who is expected to win a U.S House seat in Georgia.
Vice President Mike Pence canceled his appearance at a Trump fundraiser in Montana after the Associated Press on Friday revealed that the hosts had supported the conspiracy theory.
Pence has disavowed the movement, telling CBS last month, “I don’t know anything about QAnon, and I dismiss it out of hand.”
As some in Trump’s inner circle have shown signs of support for the conspiracy or its followers, questions have swirled about the identities of those responsible for promoting it.
In August, Trump said that QAnon followers are “people who love our country.”
Trump’s director of social media, Dan Scavino, as well as the President’s son, Eric Trump, have posted QAnon imagery.
QAppAnon, the online name of qmap’s creator, also runs a Patreon account, which receives more than $3,000 a month in donations, according to the Patreon site.
In March, QAppAnon announced on Patreon an upcoming Android app named “Armor of God,” a social network for followers of QAnon.
In Armor of God’s Google Play Store profile, the service describes itself as a platform “designed for patriots worldwide to create and share content including prayers, news, memes and posts.”
The developer’s email address listed on the Google Play page is “support@patriotplatforms.com.”
According to New Jersey state business records, Patriot Platforms LLC’s address matches Gelinas’s home address.
After a Bloomberg News investigation, the Armor of God app was no longer accessible on the Google Play store.
According to its website, Patriot Platforms “is a technology company building next generation social media applications and tools.”
The description is similar to the business purpose stated on the New Jersey business record linked to Gelinas’s home address: “create next generation news and social media platforms.”
As of Friday, the Patriot Platforms website was also offline.