New Facebook Features Fight Election Lies Everywhere But Ads (techcrunch.com) 47
Heaven forbid a political candidate's Facebook account gets hacked. They might spread disinformation ... like they're already allowed to do in Facebook ads ... From a report: Today Facebook made a slew of announcements designed to stop 2020 election interference. "The bottom line here is that elections have changed significantly since 2016" and so has Facebook in response, CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on a call with reporters. "We've gone from being on our back foot to proactively going after some of the biggest threats out there." One new feature is called Facebook Protect. By hijacking accounts of political candidates or their campaign staff, bad actors can steal sensitive information, expose secrets, and spread disinformation. So to safeguard these vulnerable users, Facebook is launching a new program with extra security they can opt into. Facebook Protect entails requiring two-factor authentication, and having Facebook monitor for hacking attempts like suspicious logins. Facebook can then inform the rest of an organization and investigate if it sees one member under attack.
TL;DR (Score:1)
New Facebook feature totally useless as it doesn't fight political lies completely... unless you have an ad-block installed.
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"Facebook Protect entails requiring two-factor authentication, and having Facebook monitor for hacking attempts like suspicious logins"
So you have to pay extra to have Farcebook monitor your account to keep it from getting hacked? Why am I not surprised?
Ironic that commercial speech is more protected (Score:2)
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Cough, cough, what free speech. Clearly the message ads for free in content, fuck off, what an add on facebook pay and pay and pay.
People who still use facebook are people no more, they are sheeple and make no mistake, they just bahh, bahh, bahh, as Facebook drops their users hind legs into facebook's gumboots to make sure they can not get away and then the pants drop and the screwing begins.
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so block ads, and we're good? (Score:2)
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On desktop I block Fb ads quite successfully.
On mobile I don't, but I've already blocked all the candidates' advertising.
So regardless, I'm not seeing any campaign ads any more.
I wouldn't probably bother with Fb any more either, except that's where the groups I want to participate in are located. I get a lot of useful and factual information there.
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The really egregious disinformation campaigns are not going to be in ads placed by candidates, but rather by SuperPacs, foreign influencers, shadowy outfits that are designed to circumvent campaign finance laws, the "Internet Research Agency", RT.com, Cambridge Analytica, "news" websites with names like "eaglepatriot4america.com" etc. Often, they won't even appear as ads at all, but rath
Facebook still collaborates with gaslighting (Score:3)
This is why we need regulations. (Score:3, Insightful)
Anti-regulation politicos love to tout the power of the "free market" when it suits them but refuse to admit there are many situations where the free market fails and regulations are needed. Truth in advertising (political or not) is one of them.
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Transparency is what's needed, not gatekeeping of "lies". As long as we know who is paying for the ads and people are free to rebut the contents of the ad we're good. Most political "lies" are not things really amenable to fact checking. Sure, if a candidate says "My opponent spent $100k of his political campaign funds on hookers" then you can fact check that.
In fact, such lies are already civilly actionable under slander/libel laws. But other "lies" are really just crackpot opinions or poor interpretations
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1) Transparency is easy to get around. You just donate to a nonprofit that contributes to a PAC.
2) Transparency doesn't matter because the people smart enough to "follow the money" aren't the type of people that lying political advertisements target in the first place.
3) Also, lies that are civilly actionable under slander/libel laws almost never apply to politicians.
4) Your quibbling distinction between "free speech" and 1A protections is irrelevant. We're talking about truth in advertising, something that
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regulations are needed. Truth in advertising (political or not) is one of them.
Sure. Giving politicians the power to regulate what other politicians can say about them is a brilliant idea.
The person with the most power to determine which "lies" are banned, is currently Donald Trump. Do you still think government censorship of political ads is a good idea?
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we could use the last couple centuries of concensus on how logic and evidence work.
If there was a consensus on how logic worked, we would have a different president.
not really (Score:1)
that's a refusal to learn logic, not a disagreement about how logic works.
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that's a refusal to learn logic, not a disagreement about how logic works.
No, it is a recognition of reality. Politics, and thus government, is NOT based on "logic" and never will be.
What you think will "logically" happen: People you you agree with will decide what is "true".
What will actually happen: People with power will decide what is "true".
The administration currently in charge is led by Donald Trump. The leading candidate to replace him is Elizabeth Warren.
If you don't trust either or both of these people to censor political ads, then you should not be advocating for
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it is a recognition of reality. Politics, and thus government, is NOT based on "logic" and never will be.
actually, our system has gotten more and more logical over the past number of centuries... maybe you're just impatient.
What you think will "logically" happen: People you you agree with will decide what is "true".
No, I don't think that. People often disagree even when they check the facts and even when they agree fully on the facts. For example, if there's one last beer, we can both acknowledge that and disagree who should have it. What I think will happen is with the rules of evidence and logical systems, we will use one, say defined by a "constitution" or some other agreement, we will have what
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We do not have a dictatorship, and as long as we can keep that in the case ...
A big reason we have avoid dictatorship is the free press.
Claiming that we can dispose of the free press because, hey, we aren't a dictatorship, is foolish circular reasoning.
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If only science were possible!
These aren't the kind of facts we're talking about! I don't understand why people are so dense on this issue.
We're talking about statements like "Obama Care creates death panels that will determine whether you get the care you need". Is that a fact? Depends on what you mean by "death panel", which is pretty subjective. There are ways of interpreting it where it's true, there are ways of interpreting it where its false.
But even if the science were possible, do you have any idea how science works in a tota
luckilly... (Score:1)
... we are not yet in a totalitarian regime pushing just one kind of propaganda... we have actual scholars and concerned citizens that pay attention to material facts, with honest disagreements, and we do not need to protect Alex Jones' right to say we're being run by lizards people and demons, in order to maintain the right to have that rational discussion among honestly disagreeing minds. In fact, it's the opposite, I think. And it is possible to tell the different. It is not at the level of skeptical
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we have actual scholars and concerned citizens that pay attention to material facts
Those sort of people don't win elections. They will not be staffing your censorship bureau.
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Once again you've missed the point: who picks the censors? The answer is Trump. Trump picks the scientists who will pronounce whether global warming is real. Maybe he'll delegate to Pence the choice of the scientists who will pronounce whether science says abortion is baby murder.
You can't give power to the government on the assumption that the government is good people! If we were angles, we would not need government. If we were governed by angels, we would not need democracy. But for men to govern m
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In most democracies there is an independent body who looks in to electoral advertising/spending. In the UK it's the Electoral Commission.
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We shouldn't have any censorship. We should have free discussion of the issues. If someone's wrong about something, let them speak out so we can show how they're wrong.
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A side of politics gets to set the "regulations are needed" part?
To stop the memes, links, art and comments about poor health?
So their side of politics can win?
To stop people from publishing, protesting, recalling, uploading, reviewing, linking?
No cartoons? No video clips? No jokes? No news?
So the "better" side of politics can win? The side of politics a company supports?
The "free market" allows anyone to publish a funny cartoon, funny art, the funny coughing m
This is my shocked face (Score:3)
Facebook does nothing to risk the income from political ads.
What I don't understand, by the way, is why anyone pays any attention to FB ads. I deliberately block every ad that shows up in my feed, and mark 2 strikes against any organization that advertises there (even ones that I have used/bought from in the past...)
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I don't think it's the income from political ads they're worried about. They're worried about all the conservatives who have their panties in a bunch because of characters like Alex Jones being banned from various social media platforms. The last thing they want is all of the conservatives creating a Fox News version of social media (I'm pretty sure these already exist, but Facebook doesn't want them to gain traction). If you think the U.S. is polarized now, just imagine if there were separate social networ
Was this ever a problem? (Score:2)
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ie the "expose secrets" is about frail political leaders with heath problems.
"sensitive information" is that coughing and poor heath meme.
"vulnerable users" the politician and their political party getting laughed at by voters.
How can you expect people to be honest... (Score:1)
... when there's no such thing as truth or facts?
Politicians lie. (Score:1)
All politicians lie. It's one of the basic requirement of democracy.
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Whataboutit?
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Everyone lies. The difference between a dictatorship and a democracy is mostly that the politicians and the media tell different lies in a democracy.
Even worse than before now (Score:2)
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"If you want to lie, you've gots to pay me!"
"Show Me The Rubles!!!!!"
facebook/zuckerberg said (Score:2)
Sure. THEY GET PAID FOR THE ADS. (Score:2)
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Alert overload (Score:2)
Facebook Protect entails requiring two-factor authentication, and having Facebook monitor for hacking attempts like suspicious logins. Facebook can then inform the rest of an organization and investigate if it sees one member under attack.
I assume every organization will be under constant attack, just like last time.
In other words (Score:2)
If you want to engage in propaganda and lie to your electorate, cough up the dough!
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If you want to engage in propaganda and lie to your electorate, cough up the dough!
And if you want to dispute the lies your opponent is spewing with lies of your own, Zuck's happy to take your money for that, too!
Are we sure he's not a Ferengi?
Pro-Beijing Propaganda machine is everywhere (Score:1)
It is true; I keep seeing the Pro-Beijing Propaganda machine appearing from social media platforms; even on Google ads. Maybe this is a show of "who can buy more ads , who will win " type of situation ?
Zuc is shrewd (Score:1)
Charging politicians money for lies is genius!
Even Worse (Score:2)