Facebook Trumped again by devious political animals
FACEBOOK has a problem it just can’t kick: People keep exploiting it in ways that could sway elections, and in the worst cases even undermine democracy.
News reports that Facebook let the Trump-affiliated data mining firm Cambridge Analytica abscond with data from tens of millions of users marks the third time in roughly a year the company appears to have been outfoxed by crafty outsiders in this way.
Before the Cambridge imbroglio, there were Russian agents running election-related propaganda campaigns through targeted ads and fake political events.
And before the Russians there was fake news spread to rile hyperpartisan audiences and profit from the resulting ad revenue.
Facebook initially downplayed the risks posed by these activities. It only seriously grappled with fake news and Russian influence after sustained criticism from users, experts and politicians.
In the case of Cambridge, Facebook says the main problem involved the transfer of data to a third party – not its collection in the first place.
Each new issue has also raised the same enduring questions about Facebook’s conflicting priorities – to protect its users, but also to ensure that it can exploit their personal details to fuel its hugely lucrative, and precisely targeted, advertising business.
Facebook may say its business model is to connect the world, but it’s really “to collect psychosocial data on users and sell that to advertisers”, said Mike Caulfield, a faculty trainer at Washington State University.
Late Friday, Facebook announced it was banning Cambridge, an outfit that helped Donald Trump win the White House, saying the company improperly obtained information from 270,000 people who downloaded a purported research app described as a personality test.