THE 'ZUCK'STOPS HERE
Facebook to turn over Russia ads
Facebook has cut a deal with lawmakers to hand over ads bought by Russians to sway the 2016 election, and CEO Mark Zuckerberg vowed on Thursday to cooperate with feds in their investigations and enhance the site’s security and transparency.
“I care deeply about the democratic process and protecting its integrity . . . I don’t want anyone to use our tools to undermine democracy. That’s not what we stand for,” Zuckerberg said on Facebook Live.
“There will always be bad actors in the world, and we can’t prevent all governments from all interference,” he said. “But we can make it harder, we can make it much harder.”
Facebook has acknowledged selling about $100,000 worth of advertising during the campaign season to accounts likely run out of Russia, and company officials are expected to be called before the Senate Intelligence Committee for a public hearing on election meddling in October.
Russia’s effort to influence US voters through social media has also been a focus of special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe into the election and possible links to the Trump campaign.
In his brief livestreamed talk, Zuckerberg said Facebook has fully cooperated with Mueller’s investigation and was working with other countries to help ensure election integrity, including Germany, which is holding national elections this weekend.
The company, Zuckerberg said, is also beefing up internal security measures, adding 250 people to focus on security, doubling the size of that operation.
He also promised to make political advertising more transparent, allowing users to see which Facebook account paid for an ad as well as what other ads that account is currently running.
“We are in a new world. It is a new challenge for Internet communities to have to deal with nation states attempting to subvert elections. But if that’s what we must do, then we are committed to rising to the occasion,” he said, pledging to be a “force for good in democracy everywhere.”
In a statement earlier in the day, Facebook said it had given the ads in question to Mueller and would share them with congressional investigators, as well.
“This has been a difficult decision. Disclosing content is not something we do lightly under any circumstances. We are deeply committed to safeguarding user content, regardless of the user’s nationality, and ads are user content,” the company said.
But, it added, Russian interference in the election persuaded the company to share the ads.
Facebook has been under fire on other fronts, as well.
British Prime Minister Theresa May has said Facebook and other social-media platforms need to do more to block terrorists from using them to spread hate.
“Industry needs to go further and faster in automating the detection and removal of terrorist content online, and developing technological solutions which prevent it being uploaded in the first place,” she said this week.
And last week, ProPublica reported that it was able to use Facebook’s automated ad-buying system to target ads to users who expressed interest in anti-Semitic topics including “Jew hater” and “How to burn jews.”
Facebook removed the topics after it was contacted by the journalism nonprofit’s reporters.