MeWe, an upstart social media company founded on a "Privacy Bill of Rights," said that more than 2.5 million users downloaded its app in a single week as criticism of social media giants such as Facebook and Twitter ramped up after many companies banned Donald Trump from their services after the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.

The ad-free network said that it has 16 million members — double the number of users who had signed up in June 2020 and continuing a trend of doubling its membership every year for the last three years.