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Monday, November 11, 2019

Time to 'Break Facebook Up,' Sanders Says After Leaked Docs Show Social Media Giant 'Treated User Data as a Bargaining Chip'

"As I have been saying the privacy frame is bullshit," said another critic. "Facebook is all about criminal behavior to monopolize ad money."

Jessica Corbett, staff writer

Wednesday, November 06, 2019

Common Dreams

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/11/06/time-break-facebook-sanders-says-after-leaked-docs-show-social-media-giant-treated

After NBC News on Wednesday published a trove of leaked documents that show how Facebook "treated user data as a bargaining chip with external app developers," White House hopeful Sen. Bernie Sanders declared that it is time "to break Facebook up."

When British investigative journalist Duncan Campbell first shared the trove of documents with a handful of media outlets including NBC News in April, journalists Olivia Solon and Cyrus Farivar reported that "Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg oversaw plans to consolidate the social network's power and control competitors by treating its users' data as a bargaining chip, while publicly proclaiming to be protecting that data."

With the publication Wednesday of nearly 7,000 pages of records—which include internal Facebook emails, web chats, notes, presentations, and spreadsheets—journalists and the public can now have a closer look at exactly how the company was using the vast amount of data it collects when it came to bargaining with third parties.

Technically still under protective order in a California state civil lawsuit that the startup app developer Six4Three filed against Facebook in 2015, the leaked documents from the case include 3,799 pages of sealed exhibits, 2,737 pages of exhibits, 415 pages of related notes and summaries, and a 20-page memorandum (pdfs). More than 1,000 pages are labeled "highly confidential."

According to Solon and Farivar of NBC:

Taken together, they show how Zuckerberg, along with his board and management team, found ways to tap Facebook users' data—including information about friends, relationships, and photos—as leverage over the companies it partnered with. In some cases, Facebook would reward partners by giving them preferential access to certain types of user data while denying the same access to rival companies.

For example, Facebook gave Amazon special access to user data because it was spending money on Facebook advertising. In another case the messaging app MessageMe was cut off from access to data because it had grown too popular and could compete with Facebook.

All the while, Facebook planned to publicly frame these moves as a way to protect user privacy, the documents show.

Open Markets Institute fellow Matt Stoller tweeted in response to NBC's report Wednesday: "As I have been saying the privacy frame is bullshit. Facebook is all about criminal behavior to monopolize ad money."

The document dump comes as Facebook and Zuckerberg are facing widespread criticism over the company's political advertising policy, which allows candidates for elected office to lie in the ads they pay to circulate on the platform. It also comes as 47 state attorneys general, led by Letitia James of New York, are investigating the social media giant for antitrust violations.

The Week's national correspondent Ryan Cooper, who also responded to NBC's report on Twitter, wrote that "there are some practical (but not insurmountable) problems with putting antitrust regulations on say, Amazon. [But] Facebook you could just shut it down and the world would be a far better place."

The call from Sanders (I-Vt.) Wednesday to break up Facebook follows similar but less definitive statements from the senator.

One of Sanders' rivals in the 2020 Democratic presidential primary race, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), released her plan to "Break Up Big Tech" in March. Zuckerberg is among the opponents of Warren's proposal, which also targets other major technology companies like Amazon and Google.

As Examples Mount, Sanders Campaign Accuses Corporate Media of 'Deliberate Attempt to Erase Bernie'

"All of these examples are no accident," said campaign speechwriter David Sirota. "But here's some news: We're not being erased. We're going to win."

Jake Johnson, staff writer

Tuesday, November 05, 2019

Common Dreams

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/11/05/examples-mount-sanders-campaign-accuses-corporate-media-deliberate-attempt-erase

Sen. Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign alleged Monday that corporate media outlets are intentionally ignoring—and attempting to undermine—the Vermont senator's significant gains in recent polls with "cartoonishly inaccurate" reporting and headlines.

"In the last week, a wave of polls has emerged showing a genuine, full-on Bernie surge—but you might not know that if you tuned into cable TV or read the headlines from the national press corps," Sanders speechwriter David Sirota wrote in the campaign's Bern Notice newsletter. "In fact, you might not even know Bernie is running for president."

Sirota highlighted what he described as a widening "divide between The Actual Polls and The Media's Manufactured Narrative."

The polls, Sirota noted, show Sanders is leading in New Hampshire, in second place and gaining momentum (pdf) in Iowa, in second place and surging in the key battleground state of Michigan, and the only 2020 Democrat leading President Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan.

"Despite all this data, many in the national press corps continued to both inaccurately report the polling results—and also pretend Bernie doesn't exist," wrote Sirota, who pointed to several flagrant examples that he said are part of a pattern of media outlets attempting to "ignore and derail" the Sanders campaign's momentum.

"In a report about its own poll showing Bernie in first place in New Hampshire," Sirota wrote. "CNN put an inaccurate graphic up showing Bernie in second place."

The Intercept's Ryan Grim highlighted the error on Twitter:

Sirota also cited a report by the New York Times claiming that South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg "eclipsed" Sanders—despite the poll the story was based showing Sanders in second place ahead of Buttigieg.

On other occasions, corporate media outlets like CNN and the Times have simply left Sanders out of the conversation—a phenomenon the Sanders campaign has described as the "Bernie Blackout."

Journalist Ken Klippenstein noted the phenomenon on Monday in response to the Times poll that showed Warren and Sanders—given the margin of error—statistically tied. The newspaper's push notification tellingly left Sanders' name out entirely.

Last week, Grim highlighted CNN's decision not to give Sanders the headline for its latest Iowa state poll even though he came out on top:

As the patchwork of evidence mounts, critical observers of the corporate media's treatment of Sanders have now made efforts to compile examples of the behavior:

"All of these examples are no accident," Sirota tweeted late Monday. "This is a deliberate attempt to erase Bernie Sanders. But here's some news: We're not being erased. We're going to win."

The Sanders team has not been shy about calling out unfair corporate media coverage of the Vermont senator's 2020 presidential campaign. In July, as Common Dreams reported, the campaign fired back at MSNBC after several hosts and contributors to the Comcast-owned network launched a series of fact-free attacks on Sanders.

The Vermont senator in August also called out what he described as biased coverage of the campaign by the Washington Post, owned by world's richest man and Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos.

"We've said from the start that we will have to take on virtually the entire media establishment in this campaign, and so far that has proven to be true," Sanders tweeted at the time. "Ok. Fine. We are ready."