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My worry: we’re covering and they’re executing political ad spending the same as 2016. Micro-targeting, lookalike targeting, custom audience matching in Facebook for political persuasion is all just as legal as 2016. This is a very, very bad thing. axios.com/where-trumps-f… 
Data was illegally harvested, data was sold and then it was used to microtarget with voter suppression efforts. There has been no change in leadership at Facebook. Other than verbal promises from Facebook, it's not clear what will prevent this from happening again.
Point being, we're so beyond spend and topics. dark ads and content microtargeted to audiences is still a reality. recalled last night how I watched live someone from rural Michigan receive microtargeted intentionally false info thru Facebook the day before the 2016 election.
With the power Facebook has over our information ecosystem, our lives and democratic systems, it is vital to know whether we can trust the company. Many of its practices prior to reports of the Cambridge Analytica scandal clearly warrant significant distrust.
Although there has been a well-documented and exhausting trail of apologies, it's important to note that there has been little or no change in the leadership or governance of Facebook, Inc.
In fact, the company has repeatedly refused to have its CEO offer evidence to pressing international governments wanting to ask smart questions, leaving lawmakers with many unanswered questions.
Equally troubling, other than verbal promises from Facebook, it's not clear what will prevent this from happening again. There should be a deeper probe, as there is still much to learn about what happened and how much Facebook knew about the scandal before it became public.
Facebook should be required to have an independent audit of its user account practices and its decisions to preserve or purge real and fake accounts over the past decade.
Policy-makers globally must hold digital platforms accountable for helping to build a healthy marketplace, restoring consumer trust and restoring competition.
A few more bits. Right now, we are grateful for
@AGKarlRacine teams' work to move case forward coupled with ongoing push by @CommonsCMS @HoCCommittees @DamianCollins @bobzimmermp
and International Grand Committee working across oceans to seek answers and share info globally.
@AGKarlRacine teams' work to move case forward coupled with ongoing push by @CommonsCMS @HoCCommittees @DamianCollins @bobzimmermp
and International Grand Committee working across oceans to seek answers and share info globally.
And by all means, some press has also moved the needle but no doubt @carolecadwalla stands well above it all with her key scoops and the attacks she still has to deal with. See this thread. Good on @hugorifkind for defending her.
@carolecadwalla @hugorifkind real-world example, I recalled last night in a conversation how I was with family in Louisville on the evening prior to 2016 election and had witnessed in real-time a resident of rural Michigan receive (AND BELIEVE) an intentionally false story which endorsed Donald Trump. /1
The article was the fake news that the Pope had endorsed Donald Trump. It had popped into her feed and she shared it verbally in a positive way to me. I got the impression it reassured her of her voting decision. I was mostly a stranger to her. /2
We know Facebook data was abused, we know polling data was shared, we know Michigan was a focus. Now consider this video which came out this morning of Bannon talking about they micro-targeted Catholics based on frequency of geofenced Church visits. /3
Now also know targeted advertising is expensive. But if you only need ads to seed content, it gets a lot cheaper. If you create inauthentic accounts & use them to "Like" and therefore "tip" certain influential content into organic feeds, you the eliminate advertising expense. /4
We also know Facebook purged and buried millions of fake accounts in the spring of 2017. Little was ever disclosed about it. It may have been innocuous but Facebook buried it and therefore we have to trust them. Seriously? Trust Facebook on something which would bring it down? /5
Bottom-line, this is real. It's not at all partisan to discuss as the entire political spectrum is ramping up globally in a digital arms race which goes to the line of what they can get away with legally and likely most will go well past what is ethical. /6
Which brings me full circle to my concern we have done almost nothing to contain Facebook, significant $ are being ramped up, people are being surveyed/harvested, messages being tested around polarizing issues, and we're all doing same things as 2016. /end
On a helpful positive note, this is an outstanding and needed move by @nytimes. Congrats, @AllMattNYT. I look forward to what you uncover. ht @brianstelter @ReliableSources nytco.com/press/matthew-…
This thread is between top policy tech reporter and Facebook’s ad integrity director. This is the probing we need to press further. This plus mass audience magnets like @karaswisher and lawmakers who put light on experts from @shoshanazuboff to @noUpside.
And if you watched things interviews with Facebook executives over the past year then I would suggest strongly to take time to watch #GreatHack when it hits Netflix this week (review=> chicagotribune.com/entertainment/…). @carolecadwalla @profcarroll
