Facebook crackdown on fake accounts isn’t solving the problem
KATIE Greenman’s Facebook profile mirrors all the things the 21-year-old Texas college student loves: Cute animals, exotic travel and left-leaning political issues, like immigration reform and gun control.
But there is another Katie Greenman on Facebook - created by strangers and copying her full name, photos, hometown and old workplace - that shares only ideas celebrated by President Donald Trump, including an image showing Hillary Clinton in federal prison. The fake account’s profile picture: A selfie of the real Greenman, sunbathing.
“My gosh, what the heck? That’s scary,” Greenman said when a Washington Post reporter showed her the fake account. “That’s me, but I never posted any of this stuff.”
Facebook in December offered a bold solution for its worsening scourge of fake accounts: New facial-recognition technology to spot when a phony profile tries to use someone else’s photos. The company is now pushing its users to agree to expanded use of their facial data, saying they won’t be protected from impostors without it.
But Greenman and other Facebook users who consented to that technology in recent months remain plagued by a horde of identity thieves.
After The Post presented Facebook with a list of numerous fake accounts, the company revealed that its system is much less effective than advertised: The tool looks only for impostors within a user’s circle of friends and friends of friends - not the site’s two-billion-user network, where most doppleganger accounts are likely born.
Facebook has championed face recognition and other artificialintelligence tools as its secret weapons to combat political propaganda, hate speech and misinformation.
But the fakes highlight how the company is struggling to use the technology to fulfil its most basic mission - connecting real people around the world.— Washington Post.