Slashdot Mirror
Did A Billionaire Harvest Big Data From Facebook To 'Hijack' Democracy? (theguardian.com)
Long-time Slashdot readers walterbyrd and whoever57 both submitted the same article about the mysterious data analytics company Cambridge Analytica and its activities with SCL Group, a 25-year-old military psyops company in the U.K. later bought by "secretive hedge fund billionaire" Robert Mercer. One former employee calls it "this dark, dystopian data company that gave the world Trump."
Facebook was the source of the psychological insights that enabled Cambridge Analytica to target individuals. It was also the mechanism that enabled them to be delivered on a large scale. The company also (perfectly legally) bought consumer datasets -- on everything from magazine subscriptions to airline travel -- and uniquely it appended these with the psych data to voter files... Finding "persuadable" voters is key for any campaign and with its treasure trove of data, Cambridge Analytica could target people high in neuroticism, for example, with images of immigrants "swamping" the country. The key is finding emotional triggers for each individual voter. Cambridge Analytica worked on campaigns in several key states for a Republican political action committee. Its key objective, according to a memo the Observer has seen, was "voter disengagement" and "to persuade Democrat voters to stay at home"... In the U.S., the government is bound by strict laws about what data it can collect on individuals. But, for private companies anything goes.
A branch of this company reportedly also received half the campaign budgets of four pro-Brexit campaign groups, and there's some dark talk about "military-funded technology that has been harnessed by a global plutocracy...being used to sway elections in ways that people can't even see." The article notes the two firms have plied their services in Russia as well as Lithuania and the Ukraine, and suggests that "we are in the midst of a massive land grab for power by billionaires via our data. Data which is being silently amassed, harvested and stored."
A branch of this company reportedly also received half the campaign budgets of four pro-Brexit campaign groups, and there's some dark talk about "military-funded technology that has been harnessed by a global plutocracy...being used to sway elections in ways that people can't even see." The article notes the two firms have plied their services in Russia as well as Lithuania and the Ukraine, and suggests that "we are in the midst of a massive land grab for power by billionaires via our data. Data which is being silently amassed, harvested and stored."
When informed about mass surveillance and privacy issues many people respond that they have "nothing to hide". My response to them is that they may have no criminal activity to hide, but with all that information they can be me manipulated without knowing it. I give the example of a first date. If you know what the person likes and dislikes before the date you can easily shape your approach to the evening, presenting yourself to be as pleasing as possible.
This is exactly what theses projects are doing to us on a national level, manipulating people one by one. And that's the danger of having so much data about ourselves out there. We can be influenced and manipulated on a personal and societal scale simply by these groups knowing so much about us.
Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a difficult battle. - Plato
This kind of sophisticated attacks reveal that we have reached the next stage in communication, where we must use anti-virus like techniques. The body continuously gets assaulted by viruses, computers too. Now it's our minds that get virused.
The same media landscape existed in mid-nineties Russia.
Imagine a media channel that is worse than fox neuz on information/disinformation ratio. Worse than Infowars and Breibart. Orders of magnitude more vapid, energetic and aggressive at spewing mental bulshit than crazy street preachers.
Now imagine that backing of such news organisation is a prerequisite for anybody to win any election. This is how it was, and this is what made Russian subhumans to vote in a former KGB leutenant into Kremlin.
When Obama won in 2008 slashdot ran slobbering articles about how the tech industry had used data mining techniques to properly target ads towards the appropriate voters and who the Dems needed to target to maximize votes. In 2012 this was repeated along with Facebook altering walls to make sure only the "proper" messages were showing up on walls.
Now the "other" side is doing it and its "evil" and "manipulative" and "fake news"
No that's bullshit. You can't praise the use of story planting and voter manipulation when your guy does it then turn around and demand all the rules be changes because for all that whiz bang technology you couldn't get voters to choose your sucky candidate. Maybe that's the real story here... that all this voter manipulation and Orwellian tech doesn't really work and individuals still pick the best candidate presented?
Naaah... they're sheep when they don't vote the way you want and enlightened peoples when you use the same techniques.
Yup. And this isn't even the worst of it, they can also do the opposite and create targeted attack ads. "Did you know the other candidate is doing [thing that you're strongly opposed to]?" And it doesn't even need to be true because these can be masked by creating blogs on 'alternative media' and conspiracy sites with no official link to the campaign. In other words. this sort of targeting allows targeted deception of the voterbase with little to no actual consequences.
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
in-depth exposure to and familiarity with US law, experience with international relations, military operations, and other required skills
That's an awesome comment. Hillary's familiarity with US law comes mostly from stonewalling grand juries, special Investigators, and congressional investigations for her numerous illegal dealings.
International relations? Pffft. She was a failure during her internship at the State Department.
And military operations? You mean like running across tarmacs to avoid snipers? Oh wait, she lied about that too.
Right, as opposed to a congress that passed a health care bill that nobody read. Nobody in congress is doing their job, so why not direct democracy?
> voters make their decisions based on facebook posts
As opposed to what? The paranoid ravings of journalists who see some big conspiracy behind everyone they disagree with?
Every month they come up with some other bullshit: fake news, bots, russians, alt right, Facebook posts, some billionaire, etc. These nutjobs whipped themselves into a mass hysteria because people dare oppose their views.
The vulnerability here are voters without a clue about reality. That one cannot easily be fixed, but throwing the staff and financiers of such companies in jail would be a start.
Does that include companies like The Guardian too? They're one of the biggest culprits when it comes to trying to influence clueless voters with their version of reality. Hell, these demagogues are still peddling the "Pepe is racist hate speech" nonsense, on their frontpage no less.
Perhaps the fact that a great majority of Democrats choose to get their news from comedians pretending to be journalists in front of studio audience on a cable channel rather than, you know, an actual news broadcast has some impact. Colbert, Oliver, Trevor, Maher, et all are NOT news shows, they are entertainment, as witnessed by the "laugh" signs in their studios.
Ken
If we assert that human brains are nothing more than complex state machines with lots of individual properties and variations - then it's obvious that if someone have the data and algorithms to predict how to alter the current state of individuals into a more desired state - and the infrastructure to deliver state-altering stimuli, then that's exactly what they will do. That's a predictable move. To say that those who do this is evil or saints is just a matter of perspective about the desired outcome.
My 2 cents on why I voted for Trump as a white male, middle-class, technology-employed, highly-educated (CS degree and 2 Masters) guy.
1) Taxes - As someone fairly educated on economics, Clinton had zero tax/economic policy. I wish she did, so I could compare. I easily could see myself voting for Clinton, despite her personal failings. But, Trump campaigned on a reasonable corporate tax plan that I see as key to growth.
2) Education - As a father of 2 kids who went through (or finishing) a public education in a wealthy suburb, I was horrified at Common Core and other federally mandated (dept of ed) baloney. My gosh. Clinton had really no stand here (other than free community college), while Trump was clearly against central federal involvement to the level that we had achieved over the previous 16 years.
3) Illegal immigration - Yes, I took all those many hours and tons of effort to actually type the word "illegal" in front of the word "immigration". Amazing how this issue is talked about as the "immigration" issue, as if it is so freaking difficult to put the word "illegal" in front of the word. I have illegals living in a rental next door to me. It is a revolving door of tenants, but the drug dealing, uninsured driving, drug use, and other bad behavior makes this issue VERY local for me. All politics are local and I ALWAYS will vote in my own self interest. My local police behave in sanctuary city mode (even though we are not), and refuse to turn these folks over to ICE after the continuous strings of arrests/traffic stops. Clinton framed this issue as nothing more than "Trump is against immigrants." Why couldn't she just propose a comprehensive low-wage immigrant worker program? I mean, that is what the country ultimately needs. I would have voted for her if she had such a plan. She did not.
4) Open source - Well, I mean "open". Trump talked to the press and anyone who would listen. Clinton gave canned speeches to small groups of supporters. She basically never gave press conferences. I just wanted to hear what she had to say about issues, but I strained to hear her message from her mouth during any phase of the campaign. If she would have been able to explain her positions (whether I agreed or disagreed), then I would have been comfortable voting for her.
5) Terrorism/Syria - The Benghazi thing sort of put a lot of questions in my head. My feeling is that Clinton phoned-in her tenure at State. She was granted a Senator seat in NY. Trump, though, had a well-storied history (past and current) of being a tireless 16-hour-a-day worker. I suppose that this sort of goes to character for me. I didn't like either of their personalities, but so what.
6) ACA - I can do math. I have an understanding of models. The ACA is doomed by math. Clinton would not say the obvious. Why not?
Ultimately, the president in the US is not king/queen. But, because it is our only elected national office, it gives our nutty press/entertainment industry something to rally around. I thought the election was totally entertaining. I love watching all the "protests" and the frothing at the mouth by singers and actors. If the corporate tax rate gets lowered, illegal immigration is somewhat stemmed, the dept of ed gets a smack down, and the ACA gets replaced with a workable plan, then I'm good and we will have moved forward, as we always do.
"If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid." - Epictetus
The problem with this conspiracy theory is that if the billionaires got to pick the president, it would have been Jeb Bush, not Donald Trump. Do you think that "the elite" wanted TPP cancelled, NAFTA re-negotiated, and subsidized pensions/healthcare for coal miners? Most billionaires would have picked Hillary over Donald. She was the "status quo" candidate, and the status quo is working pretty well for them.