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24 Oct, 5 tweets, 2 min read
In 2019, a pair of Facebook employees set up a dummy account to better understand the experience of a new user in India.

Without any direction from the user, the Facebook account was soon flooded with pro-Modi propaganda and anti-Muslim hate speech. wapo.st/3GkowoM
An internal Facebook memo, reviewed by The Washington Post, called the dummy account test an “integrity nightmare” that underscored the vast difference between the experience of Facebook in India and what U.S. users typically encounter. wapo.st/3GkowoM
About the same time, in a dorm room in northern India, a Kashmiri student named Junaid told The Post he watched as his real Facebook page flooded with hateful messages.

One said Kashmiris were “traitors who deserved to be shot.” wapo.st/3GkowoM "Hate spreads like wildfire on Facebook," said Jun
Internal company documents reveal that Facebook has meticulously studied its approach abroad — and was well aware that weaker moderation in non-English-speaking countries leaves the platform vulnerable to abuse by bad actors and authoritarian regimes. wapo.st/3GkowoM
This story is based on those documents, known as the Facebook Papers, which were disclosed to the Securities and Exchange Commission by whistleblower Frances Haugen, and composed of research, slide decks and posts on the company message board. wapo.st/3GkowoM

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The Washington Post Profile picture
26 Oct
Facebook’s news feed algorithm has been blamed for fanning sectarian hatred, steering users toward extremism and conspiracy theories, and incentivizing politicians to take more divisive stands. wapo.st/3bdEHpG
It’s in the spotlight thanks to waves of revelations from The Facebook Papers and testimony from whistleblower Frances Haugen, who argues it’s at the core of the company’s problems. wapo.st/3bdEHpG
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26 Oct
Starting in 2017, Facebook’s ranking algorithm treated emoji reactions as five times more valuable than “likes,” internal documents reveal.

The theory was simple: Posts that prompted lots of reaction emoji tended to keep users more engaged. wapo.st/3GniSCx
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Favoring “controversial” posts could open “the door to more spam/abuse/clickbait inadvertently,” a staffer, whose name was redacted, wrote in one of the internal documents. wapo.st/3GniSCx
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For three years, Facebook had given special significance to the angry emoji. wapo.st/3GniSCx
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The Washington Post Profile picture
25 Oct
Late last year, Mark Zuckerberg faced a choice: Comply with demands from Vietnam’s ruling Communist Party to censor anti-government dissidents or risk getting knocked offline in one of Facebook’s most lucrative Asian markets. washingtonpost.com/technology/202…
In Vietnam, upholding the free-speech rights of people who question government leaders could have come with a significant cost in a country where Facebook earns more than $1 billion in annual revenue, according to a 2018 estimate by Amnesty International. washingtonpost.com/technology/202…
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25 Oct
Internal documents reveal that Facebook has privately tracked real-world harms exacerbated by its platforms, ignored warnings from employees about the risks of their design decisions and exposed vulnerable communities around the world to dangerous content. wapo.st/3Et94VZ
Disclosed to the SEC by whistleblower Frances Haugen, the Facebook Papers were provided to Congress in redacted form by Haugen’s legal counsel.

Here are key takeaways from The Post’s investigation: wapo.st/3Et94VZ
Zuckerberg testified last year before Congress that the company removes 94 percent of the hate speech it finds.

But in internal documents, researchers estimated that the company was removing less than 5 percent of all hate speech on Facebook. wapo.st/3CeS6d9 Public claims often conflict with internal research. In Marc
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22 Oct
Facebook documents show how the platform fueled rage ahead of the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol washingtonpost.com/technology/202…
Relief flowed through Facebook in the days after the 2020 presidential election.

The company had cracked down on misinformation, foreign interference and hate speech. wapo.st/3b4YIi6 Image
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But the high fives, it soon became clear, were premature. wapo.st/3b4YIi6
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22 Oct
Across the Andes, a region that has reported some of the world’s highest covid-19 death rates, teams are traversing deserts, mountains, rainforests and rivers to vaccinate isolated communities. wapo.st/3iYxC0E
In Colombia, a country of more than 48 million people, about 16 percent of the population lives in rural areas that were neglected by the government during more than five decades of armed conflict. wapo.st/3iYxC0E
In this remote part of the northern department of La Guajira, home to the country’s largest Indigenous population, there are no paved roads, no electricity, no running water and no other access to the vaccines that would protect their communities. wapo.st/3iYxC0E Image
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