Ah, Irony: Facebook, Meet Oedipus. Oedipus, Meet Jerome
July 23, 2020
I spotted an Axios article called “The Continuing Problem of AI Bias.” Therein was a line ripped from the lost scrolls of Sophocles. The line is:
GPT-3 can “easily output toxic language that propagates harmful biases.”
The updated version of Oedipus Tyrannus is loosely translated Zuckerberg Tractatori. The story concerns a brilliant person who created a social empire and failed to see that its technology consumed the world upon which the service was built. Irony? Cambridge Analytica? House testimony? Yes, the reality of working in one context and failing to see that “harmful biases” are what a social system generates. Which is worse? The mom thing or social erosion? Stay tuned for the next Quibi episode.
Stephen E Arnold, July 23, 2020
Facebook: Grudgingly Takes Steps Toward Adulthood
July 21, 2020
I read “FB Says Open to Be Held Accountable over Users’ Data.” The write up reports:
Admitting that it does not have all the answers when it comes to ensuring data privacy, Facebook has said there are many opportunities for businesses and regulators to embrace modern design methods and collaborate to find innovative ways to hold organizations, including itself, accountable.
Interesting. Facebook was founded in 2004. Sixteen years old and ready for a drivers license. Baby steps are good.
Stephen E Arnold, July 21, 2020
Facebook Ascendant: Will the NSO Group Documents Become Public?
July 18, 2020
Exciting news for the highly ethical outfit Facebook. According to Bloomberg, a “real” news outfit:
WhatsApp and its parent Facebook Inc. can press ahead with a lawsuit accusing Israeli spyware maker NSO Group of creating accounts to send malware to mobile phones of 1,400 people to snoop on them.
The story “Facebook Beats NSO’s Attempt to Crush WhatsApp Malware Suit” is thin on context. Note: The item is behind a paywall and may not be available to some people.
Will the legal action result in public access to documents about NSO’s “practices”?
DarkCyber will be interested to learn how this case unfolds. The “documents” may be particularly interesting. One question which DarkCyber has may be answered: “Did Facebook attempt to hire NSO Group or license its specialized software?”
Stephen E Arnold, July 17, 2020
Scam Ads: Easy to Do Apparently
July 8, 2020
A somewhat shocking assertion appears in “Easy for Fraudsters to Post Scam Ads on Facebook and Google.” The article reports that researchers posted fake ads on Google:
They found that Google did review the adverts submitted, but failed to verify whether the business was real and did not ask for ID. In under an hour, the adverts were approved by the search engine firm for both dummy businesses, gaining almost 100,000 impressions over the space of a month. The fake advert for Natural Hydration was displayed above the official NHS Scotland pages when users searched for “hydration advice”.
A Facebook ad was given similar treatment:
using a personal Facebook account, Which? created a business page on the social network for Natural Hydration and produced a range of posts with pseudo health advice to promote it. A paid promotion of the page gained some 500 likes in the space of a week. Facebook responded to the investigation saying the page set up by Which? does not violate its community standards and is not currently selling products.
Are these data accurate? Regulatory authorities seem to lack tools to influence the large online advertising monopolies.
Stephen E Arnold, July 8, 2020
A Moment of Irony: Microsoft and Facebook Ads
June 30, 2020
I recall reading a story about Microsoft’s purchasing a chunk of Facebook. Recode wrote about the deal in “It’s Been 10 Years Since Microsoft Invested in Facebook. Now Facebook Is Worth Almost As Much as Microsoft.”
I thought about this investment when I read “Microsoft Has Been Pausing Spending on Facebook, Instagram.”
The way I understand this is that Microsoft owns some Facebook shares. Facebook holds meetings for those who own stock. The meetings permit submission of questions from shareholders.
Some questions:
- Has Microsoft asked questions about Facebook’s ad practices at these meetings?
- Has Microsoft contacted Facebook management about its ad-related concerns?
- Has Microsoft management determined that selling its Facebook shares is a good or bad idea?
- Is the “pausing” virtue signaling or something more significant?
Hopefully one of the “real” news outfits will provide some information to help me answer these questions. If I were not so disinterested in Facebook, I could have one of the DarkCyber team jump in. And what about Microsoft’s financial thinking? Did Enron executives actually think about “energy”?
I do like the idea of a company which owns part of another company not liking the company’s policies. The action? Pausing. Yeah, maybe just another word for virtue signaling?
Stephen E Arnold, June 30, 2020
Facebook: Trust Crisis? You Must Be Joking, Never
June 26, 2020
I read “Facebook Faces Trust Crisis As Ad boycott Grows.” The lovable college drop out who founded Facebook seems to be in pickle. The write up reveals that the company Facebook has to mend some fences with advertisers.
Specifically:
In a call with over 200 advertisers Tuesday, Facebook’s head of trust and safety policy Neil Potts “acknowledged that the company suffered from a trust deficit,” according to the Financial Times. A source familiar with the meeting confirmed the comment. The conversation occurred amid a growing boycott of Facebook and Facebook-owned Instagram’s ad platform by roughly a dozen brands.
In a moment of insight, the author of the write up states:
The political and social pressure on Facebook is ramping up, but the tech giant doesn’t show any signs of seriously changing its policies in response to the mounting pressure, as most politicians and marketers seem to benefit too much from Facebook advertising to really give it up long-term.
What’s this mean? There are some good reasons to allow Facebook to just keep being Facebook. One of them is the data Facebook gathers has value to some individuals in government agencies. Losing Backpage was a set back, but losing Facebook, hey, let’s talk about this.
Second, where there are eyeballs, there are advertisers. The ethical compass of advertisers spins toward selling and making money. That pull is strong enough to light up some folks’ Faraday effect.
Stephen E Arnold, June 26, 2020
Brazil and WhatsApp: Avoiding an Orkut Moment?
June 24, 2020
Brazil, land of pinga and Covid, is brandishing some Lança-perfumes with malice. “Brazil Suspends WhatsApp’s Payments Service” reports:
Brazil, the second largest market for WhatsApp, has suspended the instant messaging app’s mobile payments service in the country a week after its rollout in what is the latest setback for Facebook. In a statement, Brazil’s central bank said it was taking the decision to “preserve an adequate competitive environment” in the mobile payments space and to ensure “functioning of a payment system that’s interchangeable, fast, secure, transparent, open and cheap.”
This is an interesting development. The banking system in Cariocaland is fascinating. Facebook’s confident leader assumed that WhatsApp was a slam dunk in a nation state where cash transactions take place near cathedrals located in central squares.
The issue, however, may be a lingering digital imprint from the long ago era of Orkut. Google’s failed social network (no, I don’t want to recount the story, gentle reader) was allegedly quite the go-to service for some elements of Brazilian society.
Law enforcement in Brazil is stretched. Orkut was an electronic accelerant for certain activities which the government had determined were detrimental to the country.
DarkCyber believes that usage of WhatsApp emulated some of the exploratory paths used to chop through the Orkut digital undergrowth.
The result? Yo, Facebook, stop.
Perhaps Facebook’s method of ignoring is meeting some resistance? Germany is taking Facebook to task. Plus there are some advertisers waving their checkbooks and saying, “No ads in July.”
What’s self aware mean for Facebook’s management?
One answer is, “You are all stupid.”
A new company motto. Facebook could make its own version of the Brazilian flag and replace “Ordem and Progresso” with “You are all stupid.” Interesting. “All.”
Stephen E Arnold, June 24, 2020
Facebook and Law Enforcement
June 17, 2020
Does Facebook cooperate with law enforcement. Viewed one way, Facebook can be a foot dragger. Viewed another, Facebook lends a helping hand to enforcement authorities.
It does not surprise us that Facebook has come under fire from those protesting police misconduct. However, this controversy is not about handing over private data or security information to law enforcement. OneZero reports, “BLM Protesters Demand Facebook Stop Funding Local Police.” In this case, “local” refers to Menlo Park, where Facebook is based. Journalist Sarah Emerson explains:
“In 2017, Facebook struck a deal with its hometown of Menlo Park to fund a new police force, dubbed the ‘Facebook Unit,’ which patrols the area surrounding the company’s billion-dollar headquarters. As I reported last year, both Facebook and Menlo Park claim this partnership is meant to account for a growing population stemming from Facebook’s expansion in the area. Since Menlo Park maintains a certain policing ratio, more residents necessitate more cops. But according to private emails between the city and Facebook, which I obtained through a public records request, the company aggressively pushed for Menlo Park to expand its police force, despite strong opposition from communities of color. … After several years of planning, in September 2017, Facebook agreed to donate $11.2 million into the City of Menlo Park’s general fund. The police department has hired several new officers thanks to Facebook’s millions — covering their salaries, pensions, training, and equipment — but because the city does not earmark these funds, there’s little transparency or accountability around law enforcement spending.”
The funds go into the city’s general fund and are allocated by the city council. The mayor actually told Emerson it would be inappropriate to track the funds.
Now community organizers demand Facebook cease supporting police activities, meanwhile asking local residents to boycott events like festivals and farmers’ markets hosted by the company. They also call for the Menlo Park Police Department to fire a sergeant accused of racial profiling and harassment in 2015. The community has struggled for a decade with gentrification associated with the rise of its technology sector and with the outsized influence those companies have in the area. See the article for more discussion of those points.
Mr. Zuckerberg’s shape shifting continues to keep Facebook in a mystical zone of fuzziness. Confusing? Not to a marketing oriented, politically astute social media mogul.
Cynthia Murrell, June 17, 2020
Whom Do We Trust? Facebook, Google, Others?
June 10, 2020
Internet giants Google and Facebook keep assuring us they respect our privacy, but can we trust them? Facebook, for example, just promised the personal data it is supplying to Covid-19 researchers, academics, and humanitarian agencies is stripped of any identifying information. Daijiworld reports, “Facebook Says Not Sharing Users’ Data with Researchers, Academics.” We’re told:
“Over the past few months, public health researchers have used data sets released by Facebook to inform decisions around Covid-19 across Asia, Europe and North America.”
However, we are assured, Facebook’s Data for Good program protects users’ anonymity:
“The social networking giant said it has created a differential privacy framework that protects the privacy of individuals in aggregated datasets by ensuring no one can identify specific people in these datasets. In 2017, the company launched ‘Data for Good’ with the goal of empowering partners with data to help make progress on major social issues. … Facebook said the research partners enrolled in the ‘Data for Good’ programme only have access to aggregate information from Facebook and it does not share any individual information.”
Sounds great—but are we to simply take Facebook’s word for it? The company is not exactly known for its transparency.
Meanwhile, Inventiva reports, “Google Is Sued for Secretly Amassing a Vast Trove of User Web Data.” Despite that company’s pledge that users are in complete control of their data, a complaint recently filed in federal court in San Jose claims otherwise. The plaintiffs accuse Google of invasion of privacy and violations of federal wiretapping law. Writer Apurva Saxena reports:
“Google surreptitiously amasses billions of bits of information –every day — about internet users even if they opt out of sharing their information, three consumers alleged in a proposed class action lawsuit. … According to the suit, the company collects information, including IP addresses and browsing histories, whenever users visit web pages or use an app tied to common Google services, such as Google Analytics and Google Ad Manager. This makes ‘Google “one stop shopping” for any government, private, or criminal actor who wants to undermine individuals’ privacy, security, or freedom,’ the consumers allege.”
Companies like Facebook and Google (one might add in Amazon for good measure) have obtained a great deal of power and revenue through data collection, and we have only their promises that they are not violating user privacy. Who will hold them accountable? We shall see how this lawsuit pans out; similar suits have been summarily dismissed.
Cynthia Murrell, June 10, 2020
Facebook: A Too Clever Ninja Move?
June 2, 2020
Facebook has some ninja DNA. “Mark Zuckerberg’s Ridiculously Wrong, Misleading, And Self-Serving Statements Regarding Twitter Fact-Checking The President” explains that Facebook is ducking the censorship dust up. The write up states:
Sure, they [this plural means Facebook] have a different policy, because almost all sites have different policies, but if you compared Facebook’s policies on content moderation to Twitter’s you’d find that Facebook does vastly more moderation than Twitter has ever done and Facebook introduced similar “fact checking” efforts years ago. To pretend that Facebook doesn’t do the exact same thing that Twitter is accused of doing here is just ridiculous. And, we all agree that no platform should be “the arbiter of truth” but that’s not the same as saying “do no moderation” (and again, Facebook does a ton of moderation). As for the final claim that Facebook is “hands off” when it comes to political speech, that’s also false. Facebook is hands off on political ads, but not all political speech. And so is Twitter, in that it bars all political ads in the first place.
Pretty close to the pin. However, a question arises, “Why is Mr. Zuckerberg taking this position?” Possible reasons include:
- Facebook has data which suggests that making friends with Mr. Trump is a good idea. Antagonizing the president is, therefore, not a good idea. Mr. Zuckerberg is acting in his own best interests.
- Facebook’s leader believes that Facebook is indeed different, possibly superior to the companies which are trying to gain traction in the digital world he has crafted. Thus, the statements are a reflection of the “truth” as perceived by Mr. Zuckerberg.
- Facebook is not really doing censorship, filtering, or any of the actions cooked up in response to what DarkCyber thinks of as “the Cambridge Analytica incident.” Talk, handwaving, hiring people, paying for psychological counseling are just handwaving.
Other reasons are like to exist. But DarkCyber is content with pointing out that with a couple of public statements, Mr. Zuckerberg has distanced himself and Facebook from the Twitter conflagration. Mr. Zuckerberg is likely to join Mr. Thiel as a go to resource for the White House. Plus, Mr. Zuckerberg is his warm, charming manner is saying, “Zuck you, Twitter.”
Stephen E Arnold, June 2, 2020
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