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Facebook, Twitter Execs Admit Failures, Warn of 'Overwhelming' Threat To Elections (gizmodo.com)
Openly recognizing their companies' past failures in rare displays of modesty, Facebook and Twitter executives touted new efforts to combat state-sponsored propaganda across their platforms before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Wednesday, acknowledging that the task is often "overwhelming" and proving a massive drain on their resources. Gizmodo: In opening remarks on Wednesday, Facebook's chief operating officer, Sheryl Sandberg, acknowledged that Facebook had been "too slow to act" in 2016 against the Kremlin-backed campaign that was designed to sow discord among American voters. "That's on us," she said, describing Moscow's meddling as "completely unacceptable" and a violation of Facebook's values "and of the country we love." "We're investing for the long term because security is never a finished job," Sandberg added, noting that Facebook has increased its security and communications staff to 20,000 people, doubling it over the past year. "Our adversaries are determined, creative, and well-funded," she said. "But we are even more determined -- and we will continue to fight back."
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, meanwhile, portrayed the matter as not just a threat to democracy, but as a threat to the overall health and security of his business, saying that above all else, Twitter's goal is to serve a "global public conversation." Dorsey also acknowledged a range of threats faced by his company, including widespread abuse, manipulation by foreign powers, and "malicious automation" (i.e., bots). "Any attempts to undermine the integrity of our service is antithetical to our fundamental rights," he said, calling freedom of expression a "core tenant" upon which the Twitter is based. Google, which was also asked to appear before the committee, chose not to do so. An empty chair was left at the table next to Sandberg and Dorsey to signify Google's absence.
Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, meanwhile, portrayed the matter as not just a threat to democracy, but as a threat to the overall health and security of his business, saying that above all else, Twitter's goal is to serve a "global public conversation." Dorsey also acknowledged a range of threats faced by his company, including widespread abuse, manipulation by foreign powers, and "malicious automation" (i.e., bots). "Any attempts to undermine the integrity of our service is antithetical to our fundamental rights," he said, calling freedom of expression a "core tenant" upon which the Twitter is based. Google, which was also asked to appear before the committee, chose not to do so. An empty chair was left at the table next to Sandberg and Dorsey to signify Google's absence.
Seems to me like they're a only one thing left to do. Shut them all down. Society will be better off without them.
Oh yes russian interference is worst issue in the world because we support this vaguely anti-trump narrative... but let's not talk about how we shit on our user's privacy for profit because we are modest!
love is just extroverted narcissism
Suddenly these Irish companies pretend to care about America, the land that gave them everything to start their business. America is also the country they refuse to pay their fair share of taxes to, and the country who's political dysfunction they knowingly and intentionally made worse, while profiting by selling propaganda to their own userbase, purchased by foreign enemies. Spare me your crocodile tears. They only care that they got caught, since it puts their profits at risk to face additional regulation.
"We acknowledge our failure to totally silence US Conservatives (labeled as "state actors", "Nazis", "White Supremacists" etc for the convenience of this political purge) but promise to de-platform all opposition voices to Progressive viewpoints and politicians before the next election."
Strat
Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
So, Russia placed misinformation on social networks, and who do we believe that swayed? I've yet to see a single study, or even anyone claiming, those ads and fake news reports actually had an effect on the election, i.e., convinced voters to choose one candidate over another. Isn't that something that should be studied?
Seems to me, the only people who'd gravitate to the type of fake news and misinformation being put out during the 2016 campaign were those already staunchly in their political corners.
An honest effort to fight foreign state influence would be fine, I suppose, but as we know, this is being used as a Trojan horse for the tech executives to simply further their own political predilections.
(Also, if our elections could truly be determined by Facebook ads and tweets, we would be doomed anyway.)
Because as I understand the term, while certainly mischievous, I don't understand how it would necessarily increase the likelihood of one particular election result that I would ordinarily assume to be the case with actual election interference.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
When will Facebook act on the Left-stream media sowing discord with lies about police shootings; relentless attacks on the President; whitewashing of the criminals, especially of the immigrant variety and on and on?
The 24/7 attacks on Trump back in the 2015-2016 election season by the mass-media including by the NY Times partially owned by Carlos Slim (foreigner) is just fine but a handful of FB ads is the end of the world.
I don't respond to or upvote ACs
Pose far less of a threat to the American election process than an ill-informed American populace.
Sig Follows: "Suppose you were an idiot. And suppose you were a member of Congress. But I repeat myself." -- Mark Twain
The US has a long history of meddling in foreign elections. The US also has a long history of broadcasting radio into the East Bloc. And under the First Amendment, Americans have a right to hear the views and speech of foreigners.
How about worrying about the activities of the US government vis-a-vis US citizens? This is what Edward Bernays, the founder of US public relations had to say, about US government propaganda:
The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society. Those who manipulate this unseen mechanism of society constitute an invisible government which is the true ruling power of our country
And the CIA appears to have been manipulating news media in the US since the 1950s as part of Operation Mockingbird:
According to writer Deborah Davis, Operation Mockingbird recruited leading American journalists into a propaganda network and oversaw the operations of front groups. CIA support of front groups was exposed after a 1967 Ramparts magazine article reported that the National Student Association received funding from the CIA. In the 1970s, Congressional investigations and reports also revealed Agency connections with journalists and civic groups. None of these reports, however, mentions an Operation Mockingbird coordinating or supporting these activities.
I guess we can add "uncontrollable propaganda outlet" to the litany of reasons why everyone should either disconnect entirely or drastically reduce social media consumption.
The only current threat is THEIR censorship of political opposition who they are intolerant of.
Either they support free speech or they do not.
Unless Facebook and Twitter have been made public and are no longer private entities, they are not required to keep posted everything you write. They are corporate entities dealing with the public at large. They want to attract as large a public as possible to boost their incomes and help out their shareholders; sometimes that means removing things like hate speech that might otherwise make their platforms less desirable to certain demographics.
Facebook and Twitter aren't required to give you free speech.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
I must say this is a nice touch, and stab at Google.
AC comments get piped to
Agreed. I voted for Hillary because I quit Twitter and Facebook in 2015. My mind was not poisoned. I suggest everyone do the same.
https://xkcd.com/1357
Try to pull your head out of your ass and learn something before engaging your bullshit.
Fascism: An authoritarian and nationalistic right-wing system of government and social organization. See also: NAZI's
What they are really saying is the peasants can't think for themselves and make the proper decision on voting. We're all sheep. The entire electorate can't figure out fact from fiction and we need gatekeepers to tell us how to vote. These people are absolutely dictatorial and insane.
Political strategy of today is to use the more-active primary voters to control the nomination, then excite the loyal voter base and tilt the swing vote to select the electee. It's ripe for abuse by propaganda: you only need to tilt a few minds.
We can solve this with better voting rules.
For any party with 25% or more of the registered voter base, the party should be allowed to nominate two candidates by Single Transferable Vote. Single Transferable Vote converges ballots onto the plurality-strongest candidate first, and then removes voting power proportional to the win: if they have barely enough votes to win, they retain barely any voting power. Ballots keep moving down to find the next candidate who hits quota.
This means you split the voting base: the strongest majority preference gets the first seat, and those voters lose part of their voting power; the next chunk (in this case, the other half) retain full voting power, and so tend to strongly influence the next seat. You get the left and right half of the parties nominating two different candidates.
Exciting the more-extreme voting base doesn't net you a simple nomination of a candidate with a strong base; it elects one of two such candidates, giving the party loyalists some choice. For a large party, you need that choice.
For single-seat elections, use Tideman's Alternative method. That means smaller-party primary elections and single-seat general elections. Tideman's Alternative restricts to the Smith or Schwartz set, then eliminates the weakest candidate and starts over. The Smith Set is the smallest set of candidates who each have a majority vote preference above each non-Smith candidate.
If the Smith Set is one candidate, that candidate would defeat any and every other candidate in a one-on-one race by majority vote. Everyone agrees this candidate is better than any single other candidate.
Tideman's Alternative throws out the non-Smith candidates and, if there is more than one candidate left, eliminates whichever has the fewest votes. The process repeats until there is only one candidate.
If 52% vote A and 48% vote B, why do we get A? Half the country hates A. The other half hates B.
If 48% vote A and 45% vote B, we still get A; yet those other 7% voted C. If 80% of the nation voted C as their second choice, maybe we should elect C. It looks like 55% prefer C to A and 52% prefer C to B.
In a three-candidate race where everyone votes the two extremes, your nation is ill. The winning candidate can't be absolutely horrific for the losers when a compromise candidate exists unless everyone is totally absorbed in extreme polarization. That's why any party larger than 1/4 should get two nominations: if the extremes are in that party, they'll control its primary; that party must then behave as two parties to avoid the illness of polarization being thrust upon a people who have not polarized.
These voting rules prevent hijacking of an election by exciting 5% of voters to move. Your nation's core electorate suddenly controls the election, instead of just a few on the edges.
Support my political activism on Patreon.
That's BS. If that was true they wouldn't ban so many thousands of users each day. My last Twitter account was created less than two weeks ago, and it's already been banned. I never even posted anything. I just clicked follow on a few friends.
One interpretation is that this is posterior covering: a first, subtle step toward moving this issue onto the government's shoulders, and thus off of theirs. As in many such cases, it could be another case of "be careful what you ask for; you might get it". Meaning politics and the government moving more directly into their business. They might have been better off actually doing something about their admitted failures and demonstrating progress rather than lip service.
"We can't control the narrative, this is horrible - the commoners can't be allowed to discuss things and vote!"
They just can't and won't ever admit that Hillary Clinton was pretty much the most unlikable candidate ever.
I said from the beginning she had zero chance of winning.
She will never be US president.
Thank God.
Except when people try to show a protected class the door. That's hate speech, right?
Yeah, no. This is why you lost in 2016.
If you are using facebook or twitter, you are part of the problem. Get right with yourself and delete those accounts - your physical and mental health will improve greatly. Also, do your best to purge google from every corner of your life. These jerks got very rich because we let them farm us like vegetables. It's time to take back control of our data and stop letting them manipulate us.
I read their points as:
1) We are so important that Americans could not help but be influenced by our might.
2) Now that we are actually working on the problem our superior intellect will solve the problem easily.
2a) Subsidies and hand outs welcome, we are brilliant but underfunded.
The only current threat is THEIR censorship of political opposition who they are intolerant of.
Either they support free speech or they do not.
Unless Facebook and Twitter have been made public and are no longer private entities, they are not required to keep posted everything you write. They are corporate entities dealing with the public at large. They want to attract as large a public as possible to boost their incomes and help out their shareholders; sometimes that means removing things like hate speech that might otherwise make their platforms less desirable to certain demographics.
Facebook and Twitter aren't required to give you free speech.
And this should change.
That's the point everyone is making, that although it is perfectly legal that these sites are censoring whoever they like, that should change.
There's some legal precedent for this: when a shopping center is torn down and a mall built in its place, the mall can't prevent [otherwise legal] postings on its corkboard, because the mall has taken place of the supermarket public corkboard. Even though the mall is privately owned - the supermarket was also privately owned.
There's some legal precedent for this: when a service makes editorial decisions about what can and cannot appear on its site, it is then responsible for the content. Newspapers pay people to write articles, they can require any [otherwise legal] style or content they like. A blogging system with a vetted cadre of editors can require that the posts be on specific topics, can have specific views, and so on.
A site that allows anyone to post should be required to allow any post that is otherwise legal.
It's even worse, because these sites *used to be* allowing of legal free-speech, but after the election all that changed. Now that they've lured everyone in and become big, suddenly gun advocates are no longer allowed, or conservative views are no longer allowed.
Social media doesn't have to allow free speech currently, but that should change.
That's the point everyone is making.
It's also quite obvious that this is what has to happen, and that it is going to happen. The "masters of the universe" are too timid and/or clueless to realize this and get out in front of it, so expect this to happen:
a) Lots of warnings about one-sided suppression
b) The midterms
c) Lots of finger-pointing highlighting one-sided suppression as the cause(*)
d) A new law, the "internet free speech act of 2019" soon after.
And again, the "masters of the universe" are too clueless to predict any of this, or avoid it before this happens.
(*) From either side, it doesn't matter. Enough Dems and Reps will be elected to provide fodder for both sides of this issue.
Facebook is committed to answer to the US government as it is an American company and conducts business under its regulatory control.
But what about in countries where almost the entire citizenry relies on Facebook as its primary source of information? One of these is the Philippines, where once tabloids and tv dominated, today Facebook is THE biggest medium to disseminate information, thanks to the mobile phone and subsidized access to Facebook courtesy of the telco duopoly.
Duterte's campaign team used it to propel a known murderer into the presidency, whereby he immediately implemented his War on Drugs which has since claimed over 12,000 lives. His first two years in office has also seen the economy plummet to new lows, with inflation at its highest in close to a decade and currently the highest in asia.
And now that Duterte's social media propaganda is state-sponsored, you can then understand why his approval ratings are the highest in history. This is even if his sound bites make Trump sound like Anne Frank in comparison (even more so in the vernacular).
I am unsure if Facebook will be able to fix itself because if it doesn't, you can very well imagine what the consequences are for Filipinos.
Let's take a look at the issues Facebook is facing.
1. Fake news
2. Political ads by foreign powers
3. Censorship because of political views
4. Egregious selling of personal data to advertisers
The first two are difficult to detect because they are fake stories/ads posing as real ones. You have to think that with all the engineers Facebook has that they would have at least tried to solve this problem. But Facebook has really taken the position in the past that they really don't care. That is until their stock got slammed last month. Now they care.
The last two are within Facebook's control but chooses to ignore the problem because of political bias or outright greed. Greed is good, right?
Google had the motto of "don't be evil". Facebook's motto is "we just don't care".
Right, because WW3 in the form of thermonuclear exchange is a great way to start the day. But at least the liberal coastal cities will be depopulated in a hurry.
Yeah, I'm an asshole like that.
Life is not for the lazy.
Unless Facebook and Twitter have been made public and are no longer private entities, they are not required to keep posted everything you write.
Fuck off with this tired old propaganda piece. They're corporations, they are only entities by virtue of the power granted by the government, the government does not have the right to quell free speech so neither does any corporation, period. They know damn well censorship is on shaky grounds and people are getting fed up with it, which is exactly why they're bitching about how much of a menace they themselves are. It's a tactic to try to get people to scream "please of please censor us, for you are clearly our wise superiors." Fuck them and fuck their sociopathic attempts to control the masses through censorship, and fuck you too for being dumb enough to be their halfwit shill.
Newspapers can chose not to publish letters to the editor and have for all time. TV stations aren't required to broadcast your home movies if you send them in. If you send an addendum to a Steven King novel... guess what... the publisher isn't required to include it as part of the novel. Heck- if you record a song in your mother's basement and send it to Nickelback- they aren't even required to include it in their next album. If you give Webster a new definition for their dictionary stating that the word donkey now means dog, they will probably ignore you. A buy sell newspaper could even choose not to list your ad.
This isn't about censorship- there is certainly nothing new about this; it's happened longer than the internet age has existed. It's just about private corporations choosing what they publish on their own platforms- that THEY OWN... and they absolutely have the right to not publish your racist drivel if they don't want to.
You don't like it? There are websites that would love to hear how much you hate minorities and women- go post on one of their websites if that is more your crowd. You can go to 4chan if you think facebook and twitter are too tame for your liking. You have options and places to go to spout bile if you really want to.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Everyone brilliant is underfunded.
Support my political activism on Patreon.
Newspapers and TV Stations are also considered publishers and therefore legally liable for their content. Websites currently aren't. Which means the social media giants want it both ways. If Twitter is allowed to curate content and ban whomever then that means the RIAA can sue Twitter for every single video uploaded that catches a wiff of a copyrighted song. MPAA can do the same for movies. The reason they aren't currently is because under DMCA content hosts only have to take down material when informed it offends copyrights. Every court case to date where a site has rightfully been found to not be liable is built on this simple fact. If you become a publisher though all bets are off.
I'd like to see your source for that. That sounds like some weird quirky law. I can't imagine malls are legally required to have a public corkboard in the first place in most locations. I haven't looked for one, but I don't recall ever seeing one in any mall I've been in.
I think you're trying to provoke a snarky response.
Do you honestly have no way to search for this information?
... it's the goddam naive simple-minded, gullible membership.
Facebook and Twitter will never fix stupid. ~ © 2018 CaptainDork
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
How about illegal campaign contributions? If they are censoring political speech, that is a tremendous campaign contribution to the politics of the other side. If they are only allowing one view point to reach an audience of millions, how much is that worth? Is it fair that other people are limited in the amount political contributions, while social media and search engine companies can make essentially billion dollar campaign contributions?
You are correct that Facebook and Twitter are not required to keep anything I, or anyone else, writes. Of course, now that they are in the business of censoring what is posted on their sites they should be held liable for anything which is posted that is slander or libel. They should also be held accountable if someone organizes a destructive flash mob using their media.
The truth is that all men having power ought to be mistrusted. James Madison
Here's one about handing out leaflets.
In general, the court held that the more an area was opened up to public use, the more it had to abide by statutory rights of a person in a public place.
I especially like the hover text on that XKCD:
I can't remember where I heard this, but someone once said that defending a position by citing free speech is sort of the ultimate concession; you're saying that the most compelling thing you can say for your position is that it's not literally illegal to express.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?
Yes. And every one of those examples are subject to rules and laws of publishing entities. Do you think newspapers, broadcasters, book and music publishers live above the law? If Twitter/Facebook want to decide on the content for their private platform, let them live by same the rules that other publishers do. Wait until the first libel lawsuits hit with all their new wonderful "not" censorship rules.
So you agree that entities that choose to serve to the public should be required to serve everyone; like say a baker making cakes, regardless of their personal beliefs?
I'd like to hear the court's opinion on that, but I think that one boils down to the difference between a commodity sale and a contract negotiation.
For custom work, you're basically negotiating a contract and you aren't required to agree to any particular contract or statement of conditions.
For a commodity sale, then yes - if you generally sell something to the public, then you should be required to sell to the parts of the public that you don't agree with.
We're seeing a lot of boycotting nowadays - "in-and-out burgers" got a boycott recently for making a donation to the Republican party. Mastercard and Visa stopped doing business with Wikileaks, and so on and so on. This is the analogue to social media banning and deleting accounts - they are a public company choosing who they do business with.
Can a Telco stop servicing a customer because they have a Trump sign in their front yard? Can the electric company (privately owned, as virtually all of them are) say that they will no longer deliver electricity to houses of gun owners? You don't *need* to get electricity, and in any event you could choose to move to another city.
My take is that having a license to do business gives you government-mandated protections, and in return there should be government-mandated requirements.
One of which is that, commodity sales have to be made to anyone.
https://xkcd.com/1357 Try to pull your head out of your ass and learn something before engaging your bullshit.
And if Facebook, et al want to honestly present themselves as SJW Central, great. Make the chamber as echo-y as you want.
But if they want to present themselves as just places where pretty much anybody can sign up and post stuff, and then do a bunch of biased banning, not so much.
Yeah, they can do it (probably - but we can force people to bake a cake expressing opinions that they don't like??), but I am going to call them dishonest jerks for it.
To be fair, they said a similar thing about TV, radio, and the printing press.
To be even fairer, they were probably right.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
From just the summary it seems the threat itself is not overwhelming, just the difficulty in figuring out who is a state actor.
In reality the threat level is slightly about the same as if a bunch of homeless guys were given campaign posters. i.e. none.
No-one is changing minds on social media, or had you not noticed? That it where you go to yell, not to debate and learn.
It's especially hard for state actors to get anything done these days when everyone is already furious and insane. Can't really manipulate people that have already manipulated themselves to a far greater degree.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Oh.
Wait.
We did.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
I wish this wasn't so insightful
But it is.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Hilarious. There is no censorship. People can just other services or create their own services on the internet. Unlike net neutrality where if you only have access to one ISP then you don't have access to the internet if you chose not to use them.
Let's start off by getting Facebook, Twitter, et al to admit that they're engaging in rampant and heavy-handed censorship. Guns? Censored! Criticism of left-wing? Censored! Praise of neutral to right-wing? Censored!
Would you support Donald Trump only allowing radical right wing "journalists" to attend press conferences? Left wing publications aren't exempt from the consequences of their speech and Trump doesn't need congress to make any new laws to simply not allow them into the Whitehouse.
Throwing this back at you: "Try to pull your head out of your ass and learn something before engaging your bullshit."
1) Feel a need for vast technology/Internet company reform
2) Stage an election with an obvious moron winning where nobody could believe it
3) Have the moron do all sorts of stupid things to drill into people that he's the biggest moron
4) Pretend that the boogie man broke the process and tainted the fragile minds of idiots on social media to elect said moron
5) Point the finger at the boogie man
6) Use momentum to get the public behind reforming technology/Internet/privacy law, disregarding that pesky Constitution thing
7) Profit!
It is pitch black. You are likely to be eaten by a grue.
Bunch of BS, fake news. If the Russians helped ANYONE it was the DNC & Hillary, not Republicans & Trump. But, go ahead and claim the election was stolen if it makes you happy (or in this case keeps you angry).
How is that statement anti-free speech? The whole point is that they're free to say things, even if they can't support their statements with ethos, pathos or logos.
Which has more power: the hammer, or the anvil?