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Facebook Shuts Down Researchers Looking into Misinformation
- Overton-Window 5y agomisinformation: noun; information that causes individuals or groups to question the official narrative
- Nevermark 5y agoAnd non-governmental creators and spreaders of misinformation love calling out the government for the same as an apparently effective cover for their own lunacy. False official narratives are only one slice of the mucky pie.
- iammisc 5y agoWho has more power... the government or some tiktok influencer?
- say_it_as_it_is 5y agoLooks like Hacker News is going to have to shut you down next because you keep posting here about it. No one cares that you were kicked off for violating terms of use.
- ribble 5y agopersonally looking forward to watching fb execs hang for sedition.
- jcims 5y agoI’d give the researchers the benefit of the doubt here. But I’ve been in situations where people were doing security research and in the heat of the moment vastly overstepped reasonable bounds. It’s possible the truth falls somewhere in the middle here.
- jacobsenscott 5y agoI suspect they are not reasonable bounds. Facebook is telling the researchers to "trust our scrubbed data sets". This is absurd as they can provide, omit, and modify the data as they see fit. The FB provided data sets are just free advertising for FB, and useless for research. I would expect a good researcher to say "No, I'll collect my own data, thanks."
- judge2020 5y agoThey were still using the same means of gathering that info as malware would. It's like wiretapping someone's conversation with you - not illegal in most states but they don't have to play nice, even if you were trying to 'research' their behavior.
- jacobsenscott 5y agoIt isn't like malware at all. They tell you exactly what data they collect, you need to opt in, and their code is opensource https://adobserver.org/ https://adobserver.org/ I have the right to do anything I want with the data facebook sends to my computer - including sending it to NYU researchers.
- jcims 5y agoYou can certainly assert that right and probably defend it successfully legally but it’s not obvious that its compatible with their terms of use. https://m.facebook.com/terms.php https://m.facebook.com/terms.php I’m no lawyer and have no idea if those terms are enforceable or even legal. Practically I think Facebook is just punching itself in the face here, but it is their platform and they do have some say in how it’s used. The point of my original post is that I’ve had experience where researchers try to use the ends to justify their means and then cry foul when they are told that this means can’t be allowed to continue. (Eg in the infosec context rather than breaking into an account they own through some vulnerability, set up automation to break into thousands of those owned by customers and download all of their data). Again I’m giving the researchers the benefit of the doubt, but i think the phenomenon still applies and in the general case is worth paying attention to when this kind of headline comes out.
- whymauri 5y agoAP: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28112991 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28112991 Daily Dot (first thread on HN, I think): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28063637 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28063637 Mozilla Statement: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28068359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28068359 Just felt like there's a lot of discourse and context that could be helpful.
- dang 5y agoThanks! Combined and macroexpanded, this is the list that I get. There may have been other threads as well: Facebook shuts out NYU academics’ research on political ads - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28112991 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28112991 - Aug 2021 (34 comments) U.S. FTC says Facebook misused privacy decree to shut down ad research - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28082371 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28082371 - Aug 2021 (112 comments) Facebook’s claims about the Ad Observer are wrong - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28068359 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28068359 - Aug 2021 (105 comments) Facebook bans researchers who were investigating Facebook ads - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28063637 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28063637 - Aug 2021 (77 comments) AdObserver Blocked by Facebook - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28059869 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28059869 - Aug 2021 (46 comments)
- Syonyk 5y agoFacebook has a problem with misinformation - it's just that their problem isn't the same as what people assume their problem is. "Misinformation" tends to be spectacularly engaging content - which is quite profitable. People upset about misinformation on Facebook tend to use Facebook less, which is less profitable. The ideal solution for Facebook is that they can show misinformation to people they know will outrage-scroll as a result, while not showing misinformation to people who might be upset about Facebook not really having done much about it. "Transparency" extensions and such violate this, badly. You might find out what sort of ads Facebook shows your aunt out one side of their site while talking about how they're combatting misinformation on the other. They've solved the problem.
- prox 5y agoIs there a name for this skewing?
- Syonyk 5y agoZucking it up? I just put it in the category of "What's Good for Facebook is Good for Facebook."
- Enginerrrd 5y agoWhile I wouldn't be surprised at this at all given their track record and incentives, is there any evidence that this is what they're doing?
- darig 5y agohttps://www.facebook.com/business/ads/ad-targeting https://www.facebook.com/business/ads/ad-targeting
- Syonyk 5y agoAt some point, many years ago, it was reasonable to assume Facebook had something resembling honest intentions. That has been proven wrong so many times, across such a wide range of topics, that at this point it's reasonable to assume actions by Facebook correspond to "What makes us more money," and any press release about the actions is "How can we spin this in such a way that the most people possible will swallow it and keep using Facebook?"
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- golemiprague 5y agoA company with billions of users and posts can't even target most people with the right advertising, which is their core money making business, let alone decide what is misinformation. They should stop being so arrogant and instead give people couple of tools to block or show whatever they want, letting them decide what is miss information and what is not. Each person has a different interpretation of what they consider as "facts", let alone interpretation of those "facts".
- axguscbklp 5y agoResearch into "misinformation" is often used to justify politically-motivated censorship. If this research was intended, by its funders and/or the researchers themselves, to further politically-motivated censorship, then I have no sympathy for the researchers.
- notheretoo 5y agoI thought we just heard for 6 months that private companies can ban whoever they want…
- SeanLuke 5y agoDid you read somewhere that Facebook didn't have the right to do this? There's a difference between legality and ethics.
- notheretoo 5y agoWhat exactly were the ethics behind removing any reference to wuhan institute of virology being the source of covid? Ethics to you does not mean ethics to me.
- iammisc 5y agoOkay great, let's discuss the ethics of twitter banning the sitting president of the united states. This is ridiculous. Those of concerned by the ridiculous excusal of this behavior as being okay because they're 'private companies' made this argument many months ago only to be told we're in favor of overriding human rights.
- myko 5y agoAt the time he was banned he was actively attempting a coup. Many of his followers still believe he will be reinstated as POTUS and he has done little to disabuse them of that notion.
- iammisc 5y agoConsidering the riot in the capitol building started while he was giving a speech during which he asked those listening to him to make their voices 'peacefully heard'. Many other American politicians were behind similar riots and get away with it. For example, the riots surrounding the nomination and confirmation of Justice Kavanaugh where the Supreme Court building was stormed.
- 0x500x79 5y agoYou are the product, not the primary user for Facebook. With this comes the spiral to create more engagement to be able to "sell" you more (selling your attention in the form of ads). With this in mind it should come at no surprise that there is a possibility that Facebook promotes content based on its engagement, and not on its correctness nor its contribution to society. I am interested if these researchers will post their learnings so far. Their message resonates with me personally due to the spiral I have seen among friends and family into Facebook content that is intentionally misleading (on all fronts, not just political or about vaccines).
- dqpb 5y agoMuch easier than shutting down misinformation. In other news, of you want to reduce the number of new Covid cases, all you have to do is stop counting!
- unethical_ban 5y agoIt seems Facebook is doing what Amazon does with its workers: Prevent the people from talking to each other, to get a real idea of what the platform is doing to them. This tool the researchers developed was an opt-in program for people to submit to the researchers what they were served by Facebook. Facebook doesn't want the people, the government, or its competitors realizing the ways in which they serve content to people, or how tolerant they are of lies and hate on their platform if it makes them money.