Facebook Says Russian Firms ‘Scraped’ Data, Some for Facial Recognition
Oops! Facing Backlash, Silicon Valley Says It Can Change Facebook, Microsoft and other big players say they have a greater responsibility to mitigate the dangers of their own creations
By Sam Schechner
Jan. 25, 2019 7:40 a.m. ET
DAVOS, Switzerland—The world’s biggest tech firms have a message for
the world’s policy makers and business leaders: We’re changing our ways.
Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg Says It wasn't me, I swear
What to do when you're among the millions swept up in a data breach
Mike,
a Raytheon employee, had a trove of personal information stolen in a
cyberattack that affected millions. Here’s what happened and how he
dealt with it:
The email came on an August morning.
My identity protection service – the one provided to me and everyone else whose Social Security numbers, travel records and more were stolen in a huge data breach years earlier – wrote to tell me a telecom company was checking my credit.
That was weird; the company was 2,000 miles from my home, and I’d never contacted them to set up service. I called to straighten it out, but nobody knew anything. They just kept bouncing me from department to department. I hung up and forgot about it.
A year later, the collection notices and nasty calls started. I owed $500 on an account someone opened in my name.
I didn’t know what to do – and neither do many of the millions who face this kind of thing every day. I do know what to do today, so here, I’ll walk through how I’ve handled the theft of my identity through the years – including a few mistakes I made and how I’ve corrected course.
The ID protection service also helped me file a dispute on the fraudulent credit inquiry. Next, we conference-called the fraud department at the telecom company. They marked the account as fraudulent but refused to stop collections until I filed a form that required my SSN, a copy of my driver’s license and proof of address during the time the fraud occurred.
That was more information than it took the ID thief to open the account in the first place. Having already had my information stolen, I didn’t exactly feel like handing it over again. I took a different tack.
I got a theft report, a recovery plan and a customized letter asserting my rights as a victim. I sent the report, letter and proof of my identity to the collection agency, telling them the account was fraudulent and that the law required them to stop collection. It worked. They backed off.
Then I filed an identity theft report with my local police department and utility fraud reports with the appropriate agencies in both my state and the state where it occurred. All three were easy to do online, and they also lend legitimacy: Just like the FTC report, I signed these under penalty of perjury.
I sent all these documents to the telecom – even the fraud form they'd wanted originally. I left my SSN blank and redacted sensitive information on my drivers license and proof of residency.
From there, I checked my ID protection service to see exactly what they were monitoring. They were keeping an eye out for uses of my SSN, email, name and more, but there were a few other unchecked options, like my passport number and my kids’ personally identifiable information, so I selected those as well and ran a scan.
No results found. Phew.
A few months later, we noticed someone had logged into the family accounts on our music subscription service and replaced the names and emails. So I changed the password on the master account, deleted the new fake accounts and set the old ones up again. Then I got a security notification that someone signed into our video streaming service from eastern Europe. I changed the password and signed out of all devices.
I checked the password manager on my phone, and let's just say I had some work to do on my cyber hygiene (more on that from our experts here). I closed accounts I no longer used. For the others, I switched to strong, unique passwords – no duplicates. And whenever a site or service offered two-factor identification, you can bet I enabled it.
At first, this whole thing left me rattled. But now that I’ve changed my approach and improved my cyber hygiene, I feel empowered. I know what’s been taken. I know what to look for. And I know that if I ever get caught up in another data breach, I won’t react with fear or exasperation. I’ll know just what to do.
Facebook told the BBC it was at the start of a "long process".
The plan was first reported in the New York Times and is believed to be a personal project of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Once complete, the merger would mean that a Facebook user could communicate directly with someone who only has a WhatsApp account. This is currently impossible as the applications have no common core.
The work to merge the three elements has already begun, reported the NYT, and is expected to be completed by the end of 2019 or early next year.
By effectively joining all its users into one massive group Facebook could compete more effectively with Google's messaging services and Apple's iMessage, suggested Makena Kelly on tech news site The Verge.
"We want to build the best messaging experiences we can; and people want messaging to be fast, simple, reliable and private," said Facebook in a statement.
"We're working on making more of our messaging products end-to-end encrypted and considering ways to make it easier to reach friends and family across networks," it added.
The statement said there was a lot of "discussion and debate" about how the system would eventually work.
The NYT claimed that Mr Zuckerberg's championing of the plan to connect the messaging system had caused "internal strife". It was part of the reason that the founders of both Instagram and WhatsApp left last year.
The decision comes as Facebook faces repeated investigations and criticisms over the way it has handled and safeguarded user data.
Comprehensively linking user data at a fundamental level may prompt regulators to take another look at its data handling practices.
The UK's Information Commissioner has already conducted investigations into how much data is shared between WhatsApp and Facebook.
The email came on an August morning.
My identity protection service – the one provided to me and everyone else whose Social Security numbers, travel records and more were stolen in a huge data breach years earlier – wrote to tell me a telecom company was checking my credit.
That was weird; the company was 2,000 miles from my home, and I’d never contacted them to set up service. I called to straighten it out, but nobody knew anything. They just kept bouncing me from department to department. I hung up and forgot about it.
A year later, the collection notices and nasty calls started. I owed $500 on an account someone opened in my name.
I didn’t know what to do – and neither do many of the millions who face this kind of thing every day. I do know what to do today, so here, I’ll walk through how I’ve handled the theft of my identity through the years – including a few mistakes I made and how I’ve corrected course.
Check and alert
I should have called the ID protection service immediately after reading that email. But calling even as late as I did still helped. My case manager put a one-year alert on my credit, meaning the big three credit agencies had to contact me and verify my identity before anyone could open an account in my name. I also had the option to freeze my credit. Both choices are free in most states and are available to anyone at any time.The ID protection service also helped me file a dispute on the fraudulent credit inquiry. Next, we conference-called the fraud department at the telecom company. They marked the account as fraudulent but refused to stop collections until I filed a form that required my SSN, a copy of my driver’s license and proof of address during the time the fraud occurred.
That was more information than it took the ID thief to open the account in the first place. Having already had my information stolen, I didn’t exactly feel like handing it over again. I took a different tack.
Use the internet to fight back
The internet helped me get into this mess, but it also helped me straighten it out. I went to identitytheft.gov, a free and user-friendly site for victims of ID theft. There, I filed a fraud report with the Federal Trade Commission and signed it under penalty of perjury – a helpful step in showing creditors your claim is legitimate.I got a theft report, a recovery plan and a customized letter asserting my rights as a victim. I sent the report, letter and proof of my identity to the collection agency, telling them the account was fraudulent and that the law required them to stop collection. It worked. They backed off.
Then I filed an identity theft report with my local police department and utility fraud reports with the appropriate agencies in both my state and the state where it occurred. All three were easy to do online, and they also lend legitimacy: Just like the FTC report, I signed these under penalty of perjury.
I sent all these documents to the telecom – even the fraud form they'd wanted originally. I left my SSN blank and redacted sensitive information on my drivers license and proof of residency.
From there, I checked my ID protection service to see exactly what they were monitoring. They were keeping an eye out for uses of my SSN, email, name and more, but there were a few other unchecked options, like my passport number and my kids’ personally identifiable information, so I selected those as well and ran a scan.
No results found. Phew.
But wait, there's more
As all this was happening, my identity service told me my logins for certain sites had been compromised. I changed the passwords on those sites but failed to realize I was also using them on other sites.A few months later, we noticed someone had logged into the family accounts on our music subscription service and replaced the names and emails. So I changed the password on the master account, deleted the new fake accounts and set the old ones up again. Then I got a security notification that someone signed into our video streaming service from eastern Europe. I changed the password and signed out of all devices.
I checked the password manager on my phone, and let's just say I had some work to do on my cyber hygiene (more on that from our experts here). I closed accounts I no longer used. For the others, I switched to strong, unique passwords – no duplicates. And whenever a site or service offered two-factor identification, you can bet I enabled it.
Ultimately, it’s up to you
The big lesson here was that, even though I have a service monitoring the use of my identity, the responsibility for this ultimately falls on me. I need to mind the alerts and act on them when necessary. As I learned, when it comes to ID theft, the burden of proof falls mostly on the victims.At first, this whole thing left me rattled. But now that I’ve changed my approach and improved my cyber hygiene, I feel empowered. I know what’s been taken. I know what to look for. And I know that if I ever get caught up in another data breach, I won’t react with fear or exasperation. I’ll know just what to do.
Facebook to integrate WhatsApp, Instagram and Messenger
Facebook plans to integrate its messaging services on Instagram, WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger.
While all three will remain stand-alone apps, at a much deeper level they will be linked so messages can travel between the different services.Facebook told the BBC it was at the start of a "long process".
The plan was first reported in the New York Times and is believed to be a personal project of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Once complete, the merger would mean that a Facebook user could communicate directly with someone who only has a WhatsApp account. This is currently impossible as the applications have no common core.
The work to merge the three elements has already begun, reported the NYT, and is expected to be completed by the end of 2019 or early next year.
Shared data
Mr Zuckerberg is reportedly pushing the integration plan to make its trinity of services more useful and increase the amount of time people spend on them.By effectively joining all its users into one massive group Facebook could compete more effectively with Google's messaging services and Apple's iMessage, suggested Makena Kelly on tech news site The Verge.
"We want to build the best messaging experiences we can; and people want messaging to be fast, simple, reliable and private," said Facebook in a statement.
"We're working on making more of our messaging products end-to-end encrypted and considering ways to make it easier to reach friends and family across networks," it added.
The statement said there was a lot of "discussion and debate" about how the system would eventually work.
- Facebook ignored kids’ spending problems
- Facebook fined £500,000 for data scandal
- Will Facebook be fined after hack attack?
The NYT claimed that Mr Zuckerberg's championing of the plan to connect the messaging system had caused "internal strife". It was part of the reason that the founders of both Instagram and WhatsApp left last year.
The decision comes as Facebook faces repeated investigations and criticisms over the way it has handled and safeguarded user data.
Comprehensively linking user data at a fundamental level may prompt regulators to take another look at its data handling practices.
The UK's Information Commissioner has already conducted investigations into how much data is shared between WhatsApp and Facebook.
removed accounts associated with SocialDataHub and its sister firm,
Fubutech. Their chief executive, Artur Khachuyan, said his companies had
complied with Facebook’s policies.CreditCreditElijah Nouvelage/Reuters
By Jack Nicas
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SAN FRANCISCO — On the same day Facebook announced that it had carried out its biggest purge yet
of American accounts peddling disinformation, the company quietly made
another revelation: It had removed 66 accounts, pages and apps linked to
Russian firms that build facial recognition software for the Russian
government.
SAN FRANCISCO — On the same day Facebook announced that it had carried out its biggest purge yet
of American accounts peddling disinformation, the company quietly made
another revelation: It had removed 66 accounts, pages and apps linked to
Russian firms that build facial recognition software for the Russian
government.
Facebook said Thursday
that it had removed any accounts associated with SocialDataHub and its
sister firm, Fubutech, because the companies violated its policies by
scraping data from the social network.
that it had removed any accounts associated with SocialDataHub and its
sister firm, Fubutech, because the companies violated its policies by
scraping data from the social network.
“Facebook
has reason to believe your work for the government has included
matching photos from individuals’ personal social media accounts in
order to identify them,” the company said in a cease-and-desist letter
to SocialDataHub that was dated Tuesday and viewed by The New York
Times.
has reason to believe your work for the government has included
matching photos from individuals’ personal social media accounts in
order to identify them,” the company said in a cease-and-desist letter
to SocialDataHub that was dated Tuesday and viewed by The New York
Times.
Facebook gave the companies until Friday to detail what data they had taken and then delete it all.
The
case illustrates a new reality for Facebook. SocialDataHub and Fubutech
have been around for at least four years, relying in part on Facebook
data to build products that might alarm some civil-liberty advocates.
case illustrates a new reality for Facebook. SocialDataHub and Fubutech
have been around for at least four years, relying in part on Facebook
data to build products that might alarm some civil-liberty advocates.
removed accounts associated with SocialDataHub and its sister firm,
Fubutech. Their chief executive, Artur Khachuyan, said his companies had
complied with Facebook’s policies.CreditCreditElijah Nouvelage/Reuters
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As Facebook is taking a closer look at
its own products amid increasing scrutiny and public outcry, it is
finding more examples of companies that have been exploiting its global
social network for questionable ends. SocialDataHub
and Fubutech also present another challenge because, Facebook said, at
least some of their data collection occurred through web scraping. Scraping is a rudimentary technique in
which computer programmers can pull information off a website. It is
difficult to detect and prevent, Facebook said. Scraping can pull any
data that’s left public on a Facebook profile — and, theoretically, more
private data about the user’s Facebook friends. Artur
Khachuyan, the 26-year-old chief executive of SocialDataHub and
Fubutech, said in an interview Friday that Facebook had deleted his
companies’ accounts unfairly. Fubutech
does build facial-recognition software for the Russian government and
uses Facebook data, but it scrapes Google search results for that
information — not Facebook, he said. And SocialDataHub’s main product — a
system that assigns scores to Russian citizens based on their
social-media profiles for insurers and banks — required permission from
the users it rates, he said.
its own products amid increasing scrutiny and public outcry, it is
finding more examples of companies that have been exploiting its global
social network for questionable ends. SocialDataHub
and Fubutech also present another challenge because, Facebook said, at
least some of their data collection occurred through web scraping. Scraping is a rudimentary technique in
which computer programmers can pull information off a website. It is
difficult to detect and prevent, Facebook said. Scraping can pull any
data that’s left public on a Facebook profile — and, theoretically, more
private data about the user’s Facebook friends. Artur
Khachuyan, the 26-year-old chief executive of SocialDataHub and
Fubutech, said in an interview Friday that Facebook had deleted his
companies’ accounts unfairly. Fubutech
does build facial-recognition software for the Russian government and
uses Facebook data, but it scrapes Google search results for that
information — not Facebook, he said. And SocialDataHub’s main product — a
system that assigns scores to Russian citizens based on their
social-media profiles for insurers and banks — required permission from
the users it rates, he said.
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Mr. Khachuyan
said that he taught Russian journalism students how to scrape the web
and that two of them had scraped Facebook for the public profiles of
their classmates. He believes Facebook mistook the students’ activity
for his companies’ work.
said that he taught Russian journalism students how to scrape the web
and that two of them had scraped Facebook for the public profiles of
their classmates. He believes Facebook mistook the students’ activity
for his companies’ work.
“Maybe it’s a
reason to deactivate our accounts,” Mr. Khachuyan said. “But I don’t
know why Facebook deletes Instagram account of my dog.” That account,
for “Mars the Blue Corgi,” had 176 followers.
reason to deactivate our accounts,” Mr. Khachuyan said. “But I don’t
know why Facebook deletes Instagram account of my dog.” That account,
for “Mars the Blue Corgi,” had 176 followers.
Katy
Dormer, a Facebook spokeswoman, rejected Mr. Khachuyan’s claim that
Facebook had conflated his students’ activity with the actions of his
companies.
Dormer, a Facebook spokeswoman, rejected Mr. Khachuyan’s claim that
Facebook had conflated his students’ activity with the actions of his
companies.
“We don’t take these actions lightly,” she said. “The fact we took the action and sent the letter means we saw enough evidence.”
Facebook’s
removal of SocialDataHub and Fubutech reflects a larger problem for the
social media company as it evaluates its relationship with third-party
apps that have access to people’s Facebook data.
removal of SocialDataHub and Fubutech reflects a larger problem for the
social media company as it evaluates its relationship with third-party
apps that have access to people’s Facebook data.
In the wake of reporting by The New York Times and others
that the political firm Cambridge Analytica harvested the data of more
than 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app, Facebook
announced that it was reviewing its data-sharing policy with apps. After
an audit, the company said it was suspending 200 apps. Some have since
had their access to Facebook restored.
that the political firm Cambridge Analytica harvested the data of more
than 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app, Facebook
announced that it was reviewing its data-sharing policy with apps. After
an audit, the company said it was suspending 200 apps. Some have since
had their access to Facebook restored.
Mr.
Khachuyan said the letter from Facebook had surprised him, particularly
because his companies have been operating the same way for years.
Khachuyan said the letter from Facebook had surprised him, particularly
because his companies have been operating the same way for years.
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“All in Russia know about us for minimum four years,” he said. “I don’t know why that Facebook sent that only now.”
He
said Fubutech scraped data from the web, particularly Google search and
the Russian search engine Yandex, to build a database of Russian
citizens and their images that the government can use for facial
recognition. “We don’t know exactly what they do with it,” he said.
said Fubutech scraped data from the web, particularly Google search and
the Russian search engine Yandex, to build a database of Russian
citizens and their images that the government can use for facial
recognition. “We don’t know exactly what they do with it,” he said.
“Maybe
government clients connect our software to C.C. cameras,” Mr. Khachuyan
said, referring to closed-circuit cameras. “Maybe they connect it to
social profiles.”
government clients connect our software to C.C. cameras,” Mr. Khachuyan
said, referring to closed-circuit cameras. “Maybe they connect it to
social profiles.”
Mr. Khachuyan
compared Fubutech to Palantir, the Palo Alto, Calif., tech company that
does data analysis for the American government. At one point in a
30-minute phone interview, he said the Russian Defense Ministry was a
client, but later said he could not name Fubutech’s government clients.
compared Fubutech to Palantir, the Palo Alto, Calif., tech company that
does data analysis for the American government. At one point in a
30-minute phone interview, he said the Russian Defense Ministry was a
client, but later said he could not name Fubutech’s government clients.
His
other firm, SocialDataHub, works with insurers and banks to evaluate
potential customers. Between 30,000 and 50,000 Russian citizens have
given SocialDataHub permission to analyze their Facebook profiles to
assign a score between zero and 10, which insurers and banks use to help
set rates or approve credit cards.
other firm, SocialDataHub, works with insurers and banks to evaluate
potential customers. Between 30,000 and 50,000 Russian citizens have
given SocialDataHub permission to analyze their Facebook profiles to
assign a score between zero and 10, which insurers and banks use to help
set rates or approve credit cards.
“If you’re a bad client, you have zero to three,” Mr. Khachuyan said.
He
said his companies, which share 52 employees in Moscow, complied with
Facebook policies; they use Facebook data only when it is public and
available on Google search, or if the user has granted them permission.
He said the techniques were also legal in Russia.
said his companies, which share 52 employees in Moscow, complied with
Facebook policies; they use Facebook data only when it is public and
available on Google search, or if the user has granted them permission.
He said the techniques were also legal in Russia.
“It’s a trick in our federal law to use that data, but that works only with Russian citizens,” Mr. Khachuyan said.
At the top of the SocialDataHub’s website, there is a single line: “We know everything about everybody.”
Palmer Luckey said to blame his ouster on politics
Facebook Inc. executive and virtual-reality wunderkind Palmer Luckey
was a rising star of Silicon Valley when, at the height of the 2016
presidential contest, he donated $10,000 to an anti-Hillary Clinton
group.
His donation sparked a backlash from his colleagues. Six months later, he was out. Neither Facebook FB, -1.97% nor Luckey has ever said why he left the social-media giant. When testifying before Congress about data privacy earlier this year, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg denied the departure had anything to do with politics.
Luckey, it turns out, was put on leave, then fired, according to people familiar with the matter. More recently, he has told people the reason was his support for Donald Trump and the furor that his political beliefs sparked within Facebook and Silicon Valley, some of those people say.
Internal Facebook emails suggest the matter was discussed at the highest levels of the company. In the fall of 2016, as unhappiness over the donation simmered, Facebook executives including Zuckerberg pressured Luckey to publicly voice support for libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, despite Luckey’s yearslong support of Trump, according to people familiar with the conversations and internal emails viewed by The Wall Street Journal. Luckey’s ouster from Facebook was a harbinger of battles that have broken out over the past year over the overwhelmingly liberal culture of Silicon Valley, which has given the tech industry public-relations headaches and brought unwanted attention from Washington.
The Wall Street Journal
Top Facebook VR exec may have been fired for his Trump support
Palmer Luckey said to blame his ouster on politics
Facebook Inc. executive and virtual-reality wunderkind Palmer Luckey
was a rising star of Silicon Valley when, at the height of the 2016
presidential contest, he donated $10,000 to an anti-Hillary Clinton
group.His donation sparked a backlash from his colleagues. Six months later, he was out. Neither Facebook FB, -1.97% nor Luckey has ever said why he left the social-media giant. When testifying before Congress about data privacy earlier this year, Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg denied the departure had anything to do with politics.
Luckey, it turns out, was put on leave, then fired, according to people familiar with the matter. More recently, he has told people the reason was his support for Donald Trump and the furor that his political beliefs sparked within Facebook and Silicon Valley, some of those people say.
Internal Facebook emails suggest the matter was discussed at the highest levels of the company. In the fall of 2016, as unhappiness over the donation simmered, Facebook executives including Zuckerberg pressured Luckey to publicly voice support for libertarian candidate Gary Johnson, despite Luckey’s yearslong support of Trump, according to people familiar with the conversations and internal emails viewed by The Wall Street Journal. Luckey’s ouster from Facebook was a harbinger of battles that have broken out over the past year over the overwhelmingly liberal culture of Silicon Valley, which has given the tech industry public-relations headaches and brought unwanted attention from Washington.
Follow Jack Nicas on Twitter: @jacknicas.
Sheera Frenkel contributed reporting.
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Sheera Frenkel contributed reporting.
Facebook, fighting off skeptics, plans to invest $300 million in journalism programs
Updated 6:00 AM ET, Tue January 15, 2019
New York (CNN Business)Facebook says it is making by far its biggest investment yet into struggling sectors of the news industry.
On
Tuesday the company is announcing a three-year commitment to invest
$300 million in "news programs, partnerships and content."
Some
of the funds will go directly to nonprofit organizations like the
Pulitzer Center and Report for America. The cash infusion will also
dramatically expand Facebook's existing effort to help news websites
convert readers into paying subscribers.
"We
don't want publishers to be dependent on us, but we do want to support
them," Campbell Brown, Facebook's Vice President of global news
partnerships, said in a telephone interview.
The focus, she said, is on supporting the local news ecosystem.
Local
newspapers and websites have been decimated by the digital revolution —
and Facebook has been at the leading edge of that revolution, snagging
billions of dollars in revenue from advertisers and incalculable amounts
of attention from audiences.
Print
newspapers were in a precarious position before Facebook was even
invented, but many journalists believe that Facebook — along with Google
(GOOGL) — hastened the decline of the business in a big way.
Google, which posted a profit of $9.19 billion last quarter, announced a $300 million "Google News Initiative" last year.
Some
digital publishers and startups also resent Facebook's power,
particularly when it comes to the constantly changing News Feed, which
can send sites a torrent of traffic, then dry up suddenly.
So the level of skepticism about Facebook's journalism initiatives is high.
Investment comes at a precarious time for Facebook
The
company is also fighting battles on numerous other fronts, from privacy
scandals to failed product launches to misinformation problems.
But it seems to be on a mission to improve its reputation in the media industry.
The
Facebook Journalism Project began two years ago. Although separate from
the company's much-debated efforts to curb misinformation and spam on
the platform, the project is related because it's been trying to support
the sharing of accurate information.
Brown
said the emphasis on local news content "came out of us spending the
last year really listening to publishers who are participating in our
local pilot programs."
The first
program explored how to get people to subscribe to local news outlets. A
more recent pilot was about membership models for newsrooms.
Facebook (FB)
said in Tuesday's press release that is committing "over $20 million"
to continue the programs, called "accelerators," and to "expand the
model globally, including in Europe."
Some
of the $300 million commitment over three years has not yet been
allotted. Brown said Facebook will hold a two-day summit focused on
local news in March to hold further discussions with publishers and
"look at additional ways we can make investments."
Facebook
posted a profit of $5.13 billion in its most recent quarter. When asked
about the perception that the company is giving away crumbs to make up
for damage done to the news business, Brown made the point that "we're
not going to un-invent the internet."
"What
I try to think about in my work with publishers is, 'Where do we go
from here?'" She said. "There is no one-size-fits-all model. There is no
single solution that's going to work with every publisher. We can be
part of the solution, but we can't be the whole solution."
When
the digital news venture Mic abruptly laid off its entire newsroom in
late November, Mic's over-reliance on Facebook funding and traffic was
said to be a major factor.
To that
point, "news feed distribution is always going to change," Brown said,
repeating a line she has used many times before. "That is the nature of
Facebook." But then she turned back to solutions: "If we can help, we
should."
Facebook
also pays a number of major news outlets, including CNN, to produce
special video programming for the Facebook Watch section of its
platform.
Brown
said the seed funding for Watch will continue. Last month, The
Information reported that the programming strategy was being "refined,"
so some news outlets would see declines in funding while other outlets
received subsidies for the first time.
As
for Brown's future at Facebook, which has been the subject of industry
speculation, she said during the interview: "I love my job. I cannot
imagine a more exciting role where, if you care about journalism, then
you have the opportunity to work with other people who care deeply about
it."
Facebook suspends Russian-backed pages targeting American millennials: report
By Tal Axelrod - 02/15/19 09:53 PM EST
Facebook
has reportedly suspended pages that targeted millennials and garnered
tens of millions of video views after it was revealed the accounts were
backed by the Kremlin.
The social media behemoth suspended the pages Friday and said it would ask administrators to disclose their Russian affiliations, according to CNN.
The
pages are run by Maffick Media, whose majority stakeholder is Ruptly, a
subsidiary of Kremlin-funded RT. While the company has hired
contractors in Los Angeles, the company is registered in Germany, CNN
reported.
The suspension was an unusual move for Facebook, which does not require users to provide information about parent companies. However, it is taking steps to increase transparency around page administrators and tackle covert government-supported information from making its way onto the website.
The social media company faced intense scrutiny after it was revealed Moscow directed a complex misinformation campaign on Facebook and other platforms.
“People connecting with Pages shouldn't be misled about who’s behind them. Just as we’ve stepped up our enforcement of coordinated inauthentic behavior and financially motivated spam over the past year, we’ll continue improving so people can get more information about the Pages they follow,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement to The Hill.
Maffick COO J. Ray Sparks told CNN before the suspension the company is editorially independent of RT and said its “standard business practice” is not to disclose the people or companies behind a page.
“The general audience never is interested in these things and the standard practice is simply not mention them, because the audience is not interested,” he said.
The company operates three pages on Facebook: Soapbox, which discusses current affairs, the environmental channel Waste-Ed and Backthen, a history channel that often discusses what it describes as western imperialism.
CNN noted that the channels collectively have more than 30 million video views.
Company records reviewed by CNN show that Ruptly owns 51 percent of the company, while former RT presenter and Maffick CEO Anissa Naouai owns the remaining 49 percent.
Facebook also suspended In the Now, another millennial-focused channel that was anchored by Naouai. It was formerly a show on RT, which a 2017 report from the U.S. Director of National Intelligence called a “principal international propaganda outlet” for the Kremlin.
The social media behemoth suspended the pages Friday and said it would ask administrators to disclose their Russian affiliations, according to CNN.
ADVERTISEMENT
The suspension was an unusual move for Facebook, which does not require users to provide information about parent companies. However, it is taking steps to increase transparency around page administrators and tackle covert government-supported information from making its way onto the website.
The social media company faced intense scrutiny after it was revealed Moscow directed a complex misinformation campaign on Facebook and other platforms.
“People connecting with Pages shouldn't be misled about who’s behind them. Just as we’ve stepped up our enforcement of coordinated inauthentic behavior and financially motivated spam over the past year, we’ll continue improving so people can get more information about the Pages they follow,” a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement to The Hill.
Maffick COO J. Ray Sparks told CNN before the suspension the company is editorially independent of RT and said its “standard business practice” is not to disclose the people or companies behind a page.
“The general audience never is interested in these things and the standard practice is simply not mention them, because the audience is not interested,” he said.
The company operates three pages on Facebook: Soapbox, which discusses current affairs, the environmental channel Waste-Ed and Backthen, a history channel that often discusses what it describes as western imperialism.
CNN noted that the channels collectively have more than 30 million video views.
Company records reviewed by CNN show that Ruptly owns 51 percent of the company, while former RT presenter and Maffick CEO Anissa Naouai owns the remaining 49 percent.
Facebook also suspended In the Now, another millennial-focused channel that was anchored by Naouai. It was formerly a show on RT, which a 2017 report from the U.S. Director of National Intelligence called a “principal international propaganda outlet” for the Kremlin.
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