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Facebook spied on private messages of Americans who questioned 2020 election

• ParksNet 4y ago
  • redwoolf 4y ago
    • splintercell 4y ago
      He's not naïve to make the claim he did. Are you challenging his claim?
    • annexrichmond 4y ago
      Probably, and if they did, it would be just as wrong. The difference is that a lot of Republicans have lost total faith in institutions and the media because they feel they are largely coordinated at this point.
      • EdwardDiego 4y ago
        > The difference is that a lot of Republicans have lost total faith in institutions Oh, they love institutions when they're doing what they want (cracking down on black people/poor people/Hillary Clinton's email servers), but when they're investigating Trump, _now_ the Republicans want to defund law enforcement. It'd be hilarious if it wasn't so damn sad.
      • beams_of_light 4y ago
        Oh, the irony. I remember when Fox was caught taking talking points directly from the GWB administration.
    • benmmurphy 4y ago
      Definitely. I know there are a lot of republicans who are happy to put their foot down if they are in power. It is fucking wrong and we need to oppose it whenever someone does this. Otherwise it is all just who whom all the way down. It's kind of sad that a lot of people were anti-FBI/CIA/etc but now that these organisations have been colonized they are suddenly pro-FBI/CIA/etc.
      • EdwardDiego 4y ago
        Colonized? Very weird choice of wording there.
    • rufus_foreman 4y ago
      Do the same thing before or after they reduce government to the size where they can drag it into the bathroom and drown it in the bathtub?
  • speeder 4y ago
    I am from Brazil. As an outsider, what it looks like to me is that USA needs some kind of law to severely restrict people from circulating freenly between these environments. A huge amount of people in the media are ex-intelligence or ex-law enforcement, lots of people in big tech worked for democratic party and vice-versa. Or the secretary of defense that works for Raytheon... As an outsider it looks to me that USA really wants to top all other countries and be first place in the world in amount of conflict of interest, nepotism and industry inbreeding. Regulators aren't much better, for example Boeing employees that analyze the Max on behalf of regulators or Twitter that are just verbally interviewed about their security practices without providing any proof. I bet someone, somewhere, want the SEC to start to use same style of regulation when regulating insider trading. "Did you insider traded Mr. Senator?" "No I didn't. The laws that I passed that helped the company I founded are only coincidence." "Ah of course, carry on."
  • kevinh 4y ago
    The current head of the FBI was appointed by Trump. Are you arguing that the FBI head has no power or that he's secretly a stooge of the Democratic party?
    • akomtu 4y ago
      On the other hand, a former CIA director or something is on Amazon board of directors now, who kicked out a pro-Trump network (Parler, if memory serves me right) not long ago.
  • throwayyy479087 4y ago
    The fact that there's no word for the Educational/Military/Techno-Industrial complex is somewhat telling. You're not really allowed to notice it exists - watch this story ONLY be carried by the Post and the Daily Wire. In a few years it will be covered by the Grey Lady - just like the Hunter Biden laptop stuff.
    • Bakary 4y ago
      "Why aren't people talking about this story that I just read about on freely available news services!"
    • EdwardDiego 4y ago
  • _8j50 4y ago
    [flagged]
    • akomtu 4y ago
      • Bakary 4y ago
        They were brusque in voicing it, but the criticism is fair. We all know the exact atmosphere and quality of discussion that follows comments like these and that it is characteristic of the toxicity found on reddit and facebook.
    • loonster 4y ago
      [flagged]
      • pixl97 4y ago
      • _8j50 4y ago
        Yeah, HN is not a general news and politics site or general purpose forum. Not once until today have I seen "democrats this" and "republicans that" bullshit. Yes, there are political discussions but they always follow the implied rule of applied criticial thinking and a well thought out opinion, not repeating some propaganda vomit you heard somewhere or party line tribalism. This just isn't the place for it. However, if they can't find the right place you can come up with a site or app and do a "Show HN" post!
  • EdwardDiego 4y ago
    I'm impressed at your capacity for cognitive dissonance. https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/president-donald-j-trump-announces-intent-nominate-christopher-wray-director-federal-bureau-investigation/ https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/presidential-actions/pr... > "I am proud to announce Christopher as my choice as the Director of the FBI. During his previous service at the Department of Justice, Christopher was the leader of major fraud investigations, and was a key part of the team overseeing the Justice Department’s actions in the war on terrorism following the 9/11 attacks," said President Trump. "He is an impeccably qualified individual, and I know that he will again serve his country as a fierce guardian of the law and model of integrity once the Senate confirms him to lead the FBI." Yet apparently, he's now a tool of the Democrats! Seriously bro?
• checkyoursudo 4y ago
  • sparrish 4y ago
    "FBI has [Internet company] spy on [all their users]" is a story.
    • smitty1e 4y ago
      America is an exceptional country. Tyranny is outsourced to 'private' industry, freeing the public sector to do victory laps over how great the First Amendment is, and stuff.
    • EdwardDiego 4y ago
      FBI approaches private company with a warrant requiring user data, isn't really a story. But yeah, if you use the verb "spy" it sounds way sexier!
  • TrueSlacker0 4y ago
    It IS a sad world that this is the normal. No respect.
  • benmmurphy 4y ago
    Companies like Facebook go out of their way to try and show that they are protecting their users privacy. For example Facebook has a transparency report disclosing requests from governments: https://transparency.fb.com/data/government-data-requests https://transparency.fb.com/data/government-data-requests If they are actively sending data to governments without a forced legal request then this is very much a story.
    • Bakary 4y ago
      We cannot trust Facebook in any meaningful way given their history
• aschearer 4y ago
  • treeman79 4y ago
    So it’s fine for the entire tech community to decide the victor in an election. So long as it’s your guy? How would you feel if all the news media only said positive things about Trump, and reported on Bidens crimes.
    • ImPostingOnHN 4y ago
      To be clear, you're saying you're unaware of any news media which says only positive things about Trump? That seems implausible.
      • dudul 4y ago
        Can you name a few?
        • ImPostingOnHN 4y ago
          Yes, but I'm more interested in first resolving the first question (mine)
  • saurik 4y ago
    I mean, this is an issue with tech companies while Trump and his pile of paper documents has nothing to do with tech? If it makes you feel any better, talking a lot about Trump--even saying negative things about him--probably only helps him anyway.
  • StanislavPetrov 4y ago
• ImPostingOnHN 4y ago
  so they could figure out who to amplify for engagement and thus increased profit? they are Facebook's favorite users after all
• wan_ala 4y ago
  Is there any other source than the NYpost?
  • Nahtnah 4y ago
    • everforward 4y ago
      > Half this article is about how it was targeted against election deniers/MAGA die hards. But of course, even that is spun as being bad in this article. From the article: ‘None were Antifa types’ It is a bad thing, because the law protects our disagreement with the election deniers/MAGA diehards only as much as it protects their disagreement with ours. Having the same opinions as people who did illegal things isn't and shouldn't be grounds for targeted surveillance. The pendulum will swing the other way eventually, and they'll be digging into the messages of people that talk about defunding the police because "antifa" took control over part of Portland for a while. Or target abortion activists because they caught a few people trying to assassinate Supreme Court justices. Trusting that government overreach will only affect the other side usually backfires.
      • vegai_ 4y ago
        [flagged]
      • lesuorac 4y ago
        > It is a bad thing, because the law protects our disagreement with the election deniers/MAGA diehards only as much as it protects their disagreement with ours. [Citation Needed] I'll assume you mean the first amendment and that only applies to the government not to private business (i.e. Facebook). It definitely does not apply to a webpage that told you in their T&C that they're scanning the content you post. The article may quote “Facebook provides the FBI with private conversations which are protected by the First Amendment without any subpoena.” but it wouldn't be worth the ink it's printed on. Time and time again it's been shown that if a third party (i.e. facebook) wants to willingly give information to the government a subpoena is not needed.
• Blackstrat 4y ago
  We all know, or should know, that all big tech companies violate privacy in one of myriad ways. Facebook, Google, et al are a criminal cartel, selling its users’ data to the highest bidder. When a foreign country or an individual does what these companies do, it’s hacking and considered a crime. When Big Tech does it, no big deal.
  • mc32 4y ago
    Man, it's been a long, long time, since the Qwest CEO stood up to the Feds on a hunting expedition[1]... I don't think anyone has had the guts to say no since then, although Apple put up some pretense when asked for access to iPhone data. Coincidentally, of course, as things are wont to happen, the CEO subsequently got caught up in inside trading... [1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qwest#Refusal_for_NSA_spying https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qwest#Refusal_for_NSA_spying
  • threatofrain 4y ago
    I live in the USA so when the DMV or cops engage in the market of personal data, that's just Tuesday. I am all for legislation & enforcement which destroys the entire personal data market.
  • jrpt 4y ago
    Facebook and Google don't sell user data. They sell ad impressions, leveraging user data to decide which ads to show, but it's not like you can just buy a user's data from them. In fact, they've gotten much stingier with ways to get their users' data. You used to be able to get a ton of user and connection data for free just by using Facebook's API (with the user's permission) but it's much harder now and for some types of data, it's no longer available at all.
    • Blackstrat 4y ago
      I think they still sell to data aggregators like Acxiom. Nearly everyone in the country apparently does
  • ThinkBeat 4y ago
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• T3OU-736 4y ago
  It feels like a deliberate conflation of what a "private message" means. Many FB users assume "only me and the recipient(s) can see". Similarly, "private group" on social media platforms. "Private" - you keep using that word. I don't think it means what you think it means. :) These are all misnomers, and more non-E2EE people need to recognize and understand it. In as much as I dislike the dismissive nature of the saying, it is true - "I can explain it to you, but I cannot understand it for you." Occurrences like these will make understanding happen. I think I am OK with that.