Slashdot Mirror
Facebook Removes Hundreds of Accounts Spamming Political Info (theverge.com)
Facebook is purging hundreds of accounts and pages in the U.S., many of which spread political misinformation, for breaking the company's terms against "inauthentic" content and spam. The Verge reports: The company said in a blog post that 559 pages and 251 accounts would be removed. While the accounts used "sensational political content," Facebook did not say that was the reason for the purge. Instead, the accounts and pages will be taken down after they had "consistently broken" the company's rules against gaming its platform. Facebook noted that many used strategies like posting on fake or multiple accounts to generate traffic, or to inflate their popularity. Still, Facebook noted the proximity to the U.S. midterm elections, and said that networks like the ones it removed today are "increasingly" promoting political content that is "often indistinguishable from legitimate political debate." The company said this was the reason it has turned to "behavior" instead of "content" when searching for bad actors.
Fuck the Zuck!
Way too late now. Damage is done. Most people already think those were real US citizens and will now cry "censorship."
Meaning, spamming non-Democrat political info
Facebook does not appear to be having much trouble taking down and banning accounts that are guilty of wrongthink. But that's easy. On the other hand, trying to ban all the robo-posted spamcrap that's flooding the remaining pages is apparently too difficult for them.
I'm not kidding. I'm watching one thread after another thread that gets posted on some of their popular pages immediately get flooded with obviously robo-posted make-money-fast-work-from-home spam. The posting pattern is laughably easy to spot: first post a dummy "asdfasdf" comment, and five minutes later "Edit" it and replace it with canned boilerplate.
Apparently, the rocket scientists at Facebook are spam filtering only the initial comments that get posted in threads. So, the only thing that needs to be done to completely bypass Facebook crap spam filters is to robo-edit an existing comment.
I've been watching these spam floods turning Facebook pages to utter crap for several months now. Reporting them to Facebook does absolutely nothing. But, that's ok. Because Facebook just got rid of all the wrong-thinking fake-newsy (in Facebook's opinion, of course) pages.
History has shown the more you racist liberal monsters suppress the people, the more they will rebel against you. Trying to suppress conservative voices just makes then vote in greater numbers...
I saw that as a dispassionate Libertarian who does not have a dog in that hunt, I just enjoy observing tactical mistakes both sides make.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
CNN?
is now "sensational political content".
Talk about politics too much and thats tracked for violations.
No freedom after speech as the account is removed.
Wonder what happens online when a citizen attempts to petition the government using a computer?
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
Is all I see in 'news' sites using facebook plugin for comments.
If facebook is so dumb they cant screen those accounts out, then..... they're really dumb but richer than me :(
n/t
...indistinguishable from legitimate political debate.
Uh...if they are "indistinguishable from legitimate" then why is facebook taking them down? What about legitimate postings that are indistinguishable from bad posts?
Occurring so close to the midterms, will Facebook get called out for meddling in an election rather than allowing status quo and allowing existing groups to execute plans they may have made weeks or months ago?
There is a better and more complete article on The Washington Post that describes the type of crap Facebook purged. Spoiler: it's clickbait that leads to other profit driven sites. Don't assume it's all conservative media either because it's not. They got crazy shit for folks of all types.
Bottom line: this is good for all (even slightly) rational actors.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
They will be screaming about 'muh 1st Amendment rights" as they are too ignorant to understand that Facebook is not 'da gubament'.
Yes, it's FB speak for removing content which it not strictly left-wing.
"often indistinguishable from legitimate political debate." - ie Legitimate political debate, but not what they agree with?
good job, kids! that's like plucking one eyebrow hair. i can already feel the massive weight of internet hair receding from my location. thanx!
> Not in the least. If you look at the tabloid-esque content that was being pushed through multiple accounts, you will see it was in fact maximally sensational.
Translation: You got triggered.
> You are one of these many misguided people that seems to think you can say anything you want and people have to just put up and listen to you.
Yeah, we don't listen to you guys either, but the point here is that you're removing things so that OTHER people don't hear them.
You NPCs should get some new arguments, these are just silly.
My apolgies, it was the rightist 'The Resistance' taken down, not the left-wing one (which is still up), so place it among "the right-wing sites [that] were hit too".
My point still stands.
I used to visit Facebook to catch up with what friends are doing and to see what events were in my area.
Once Facebook went IPO it opened the floodgates on political garbage and commercial spam to the point which diminished what it used to be and what attracted people to it in the first place.
Clearing out all the political garbage and sorting out their privacy and scam issues needs to be at the fore to fix their issues.
On the one hand people may say âoecensorshipâ, but on the other hand a line needs to be drawn to kick people out who pee in the pool at the pool party.
Facebook needs to go further and purge ALL the garbage that ruins the experience IMHO.
Use twitter for political chatter.
READY.
PRINT ""+-0
It`s good decision..
The trolls nowadays are primarily (looking at dollar spend) democratic paid writers/activists from groups such as shareblue.
They don't really contribute much having the communication capacity of a NPC in a video game. "Orange man bad. Everyone right of lenin is a Nazi. Anything I don't agree with is hate speech. Resist something."
Facebook happily announced the influx of thousands of new users.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
-Facebook censors speech of non citizens in US. Celebration by the left.
-Trump attempts to jail/deport illegal non citizens of the US that commit crimes. The Left has a meltdown.
So, freedom of speech being limited is a positive goal of the left, and allowing illegals to attack/kill US citizens is also a goal of the left. Got it.
You're foolishly attaching your incorrect assumption 1 to incorrect assumption 2.
Democrats have long been on a 'victim culture'. If people are free and successful, they don't need the democrats. There is a hierarchy of victimhood with the left, 'oh you're gay you're a victim, but you're not transgender black, so watch your entitlement'.
Conservatives aren't the ones trying to shut down free speech. That's actively going on with the left (see deplatforming, it is a term made by the left).
Conservatives majority don't about race - they care about it far less than the left.
You're acting like a simple NPC in a video game that can't explore the world outside of repeating a simple narrative.
Kill the Satanic monster destroying Russia!
Satire is political commentary too, right?
But it is their platform.
I'd rather they leave it up and tag it with "UNVERIFIED" or "VERIFIED FALSE". Then the jokes would really begin.
LeftFace!Book marches on.
Yet some political affiliations are more equal than others. Only the left thinks it's not so.
Caitlin Johnstone documents this was a coordinated attempt by Facebook and Twitter to remove content offensive to the corporate masters.
Alex Jones was the canary in the coalmine, now they will continue ensuring Sanders (and other upstarts) never gets a second chance.
She writes:
Regardless of where you’re at on the political spectrum, if you oppose the status quo then opposing internet censorship of any political speech is now a matter of simple self defense. If this wasn’t obvious to you when they shut down Alex Jones, it should damn well be obvious to you now. If you want to change the existing system in any way which takes power away from those currently in power, your voice is next on the chopping block. They’re locking all the doors down as fast as they can to keep us trapped in this Orwellian oligarchy until they get us all killed by war or ecocide. If they shut down the public’s ability to share dissident information, they’ll have locked the final door. Don’t let them.
Does anyone have a list of pages that were censored by Facebook since those pages didn't tie into Facebook's political agenda?
"often indistinguishable from legitimate political debate."
So, often are in fact legitimate political debate, being indistinguishable.
For, if the syrup you pour on your cakes for breakfast is indistinguishable from real, natural, from-a-tree maple syrup, are you in any way not actually enjoying the taste of maple? And if so, are you not, in any way, diminished having been given a not natural, but indistinguishable syrup?
So these sources, while in Facebook's view being somehow illegitimate, are indistinguishable, and so are, for their users, the same thing as the so-called and left-alone 'legitimate' sources.
Bear in mind that these 'legitimate' sources may differ only in that they use links, postings, and dissemination in a way that is approved of. For the mainstream media, this is to engage each other with the identical language, quote one another exclusively, and reinforce their common points and opinions. All of which is link farming and much of which would be well defined as using "multiple accounts to generate traffic, or to inflate their popularity.", though perhaps merely among friends, and not the blatant 'fake accounts' that Facebook is alluding to.
For we know well that CNN, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and others would never stoop to using false premises to propagate their influence, of course, and neither would the smaller entities that they join with and refer to constantly. Of course not, they somehow are ethical, where their opposition is not, because political discourse is an unequal, asymmetrical game, where only a few philosophies are corrupt, and others are without redemption, and the difference is in the eye of the beholder. Oh, wait, I meant to write 'the difference is obvious and indelible'.
Sure.
deleting the extra space after periods so i can stay relevant, yeah.
Facebook needs to go further and purge ALL the garbage that ruins the experience IMHO.
I.e. Fraudbook itself.