The issue of privacy is one that the United States will need to regulate. Facebook and Google are merely the tip of the iceberg. Many data brokers are far more intrusive, and Google and Facebook buy data from them , as well as from payments companies like Mastercard. Acxiom is a data broker that collects 1, data points per person on more than million consumers and sells analysis of such information.
The kind of information it collects is vast: identifying and contact information, court and public record information, financial "indicators", health "interests" including web searches for "diabetes, arthritis, homeopathic, organic and senior needs," demographic information such as home value, home characteristics, marital status, presence of children in the household, number of members in the household, education, occupation, and political party, "lifestyle and interest indicators.
Not even the Stasi had as much information on the East Germans as Google, Facebook, and its data brokers have on American citizens. It is bad when the data is accurate, but it is almost worse when it is not. They store data indefinitely, even when people have had their criminal or misdemeanor records expunged by courts, and it has cost people jobs.
It would also allow them to delete it. This is a good first step. Another important step is to require user consent before a merchant passes on data to a third party. This currently takes place with no user content. Most importantly, the tech giants should be regulated as media companies.
Executives from Google and Facebook go to great lengths to deny that they run media companies, even though they behave exactly like media companies. They aggregate, curate, and distribute content, but bear none of the burdens that come with that designation. Facebook's news feed has become what the front page of the newspaper was for older generations of people; at least 66 percent of the social network's 2 billion users use it as a news source, according to a Pew Research Center study. Thee are de facto editors of news content. Facebook and YouTube -- a subsidiary of Google's parent company, Alphabet -- have intentionally designed their algorithms to customize user experience to increase engagement.
They accomplish this by suggesting stories that user will be most likely to respond to. An algorithm may not be an old-fashioned editor, but it is making editorial choices all the same. They are also creators of content. Facebook and Google may say they aren't media companies, but they have been investing in originally produced entertainment videos and shows.
If Facebook and Google were held responsible for the content they promote, the Federal Communications Commission would not let them off lightly for their many failings. If Facebook and Google were treated as media companies, they would be held accountable for the content that appears on their platforms. Today, under Section of the Communication Decency Act , tech giants are broadly immune from liability over content posted by others. The most contentious issue for reform is treating Facebook and Google like the monopolies they are. In a way, it makes sense. For years, Zuckerberg routinely described Facebook as a " social utility.
Facebook and Google have become essential fixtures of 21st-century life. If you want to be on a network with all of your friends, there is really only one network to be on, and it is on Facebook. Likewise for search where Google has almost a 90 percent market share globally with very strong feedback loops from its platform and advertisers. These business models have become a natural monopoly, much like a phone company or water system except that they remain completely unregulated. Figures from the Left and Right have called for them to be regulated like public utilities.
In , Steve Bannon said tech companies like Facebook and Google have become essential elements of 21st-century life and should be regulated as utilities. The Economist has mooted the idea that the tech giants could be regulated based on a regulated return on assets. They can stay private and enjoy utility-like status, but the returns they can harvest from being natural monopolies are capped at utility like rates based on the return on their assets.
Reform is not impossible. More than two decades ago in , Congress recognized that the internet was revolutionizing media and commerce and passed two laws to address copyright and free speech concerns. Two decades is an awfully long time in Silicon Valley and technology. Times have changed, and updating the laws is long overdue. Jonathan Tepper is a senior fellow at , founder of Variant Perception , a macroeconomic research company, and co-author of The Myth of Capitalism: Monopolies and the Death of Competition.
This article was supported by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. The contents of this publication are solely the responsibility of the authors. Emil Shitalkovic , says: May 13, at am. The Universal Service Act is the right approach. Natural monopolies cannot be allowed to curate.
They need to stop using demonetizing, Youtube Jail, condescending Twitter "time outs", weaponized spam false positives they claim are "mistakes" when caught, and outright bans to retaliate against legal speech they don't like, whether it is flat earth conspiracies, anti-vaxers, Republicans, "Nazis," whatever.
Even "Nazis" are allowed to buy food, have telephones, and print newspapers in this country. It is extreme, but we decided to draw the line where we did for a reason, and have not agreed to move it since the Revolutionary War. It is not their right to unilaterally move that line for us.
Facebook = Spyware
They are so powerful all legal speech must be allowed, and the people will have to sort out what's true. Achieving social harmony, or bettering humanity by arbitrating truth, are not their responsibilities. They are not media companies. In short, they cannot be both "media companies" and monopolies because monopoly control of media is the end of democracy.
They are monopolies, therefore they cannot be allowed the editorial freedom of media companies. In the agricultural age, property land rights became recognized.
In the Industrial Age, capital, debt and share ownership rights became codified. We are in the Information Age, and it's time to recognize the proper ownership of information. The services provided by Facebook, Google, etc have become an integral part of our daily lives.
They are also natural monopolies. In that sense they are like the electric and gas companies, which are regulated utilities. So they, too should be regulated utilities. On the advertising and data side, there are many competing data brokers who have every incentive to abuse your personal data.
- cellphone monitoring tool Galaxy A60.
- what is the best mobile tracking tool Meizu.
- cell phone locate application Google Pixel 3.
What we need there is not just a law, but a constitutional amendment defining a citizen's right to privacy, that we own our own data, and we must approve of any use of it. That simply was not an issue when the Bill of Rights was written, but it is now. My ancestors didn't fight two world wars and a Cold War to secure a privacy violating mass surveillance society for their posterity.
In some ways, we're turning into the very things that Americans fought tooth and nail to destroy, and that real Americans loathe to their marrow. It's sickening. I doubt "regulation" is enough. They operate like giant, unaccountable monopolies and should probably be broken up or shut down. Do it. Harsh criminal penalties and huge civil fines for violators of individual rights and privacy.
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New York Attorney General Letitia James is opening an investigation into Facebook's "unintentional" upload of up to 1. Just hand over your private email password. Facebook admitted last week that it " unintentionally uploaded " 1. The platform gained access to the contacts by asking users for their email passwords after they clicked on a link to verify their account, but did not ask the users before hoovering up their contact lists. Facebook claims it is deleting the offending address book data and says it has notified people who had their contacts copied.
It says the contacts were not shared with anyone. New York is one of several states currently investigating Facebook based on the March revelations that Cambridge Analytica used Facebook data scraped from millions of users without their consent to assist the Donald Trump presidential campaign. That investigation continues, while the Federal Trade Commission, which opened its own probe following the Cambridge Analytica revelations alleging violation of a " consent decree ," is reportedly negotiating a settlement with Facebook. The company has been plagued with non-stop scandals since Cambridge Analytica, with users learning last month hundreds of millions of passwords had sat, unencrypted, on an internal server for the past seven years and reports from ex-employee whistleblowers accusing the site of " de-boosting " conservative political content.
Monday, April 15, Facebook and Its Close Links to Washington With Facebook taking a very strong stance against so-called fake news and foreign interference in what passes for democracy in the United States and particularly given its recent association with the Atlantic Council and its Digital Forensic Research Lab.
I would be remiss if I didn't thank Matt Agorist at the Free Thought Project, one of the entities that was purged by Facebook in October , for inspiring this posting In no particular order, let's look at some of Facebook's key personnel and their relationship to Washington: 1. Katie Harbath : Ms. Harbath who announced Facebook's "exciting new partnership" with the Atlantic Council on May 17, " Today, we're excited to launch a new partnership with the Atlantic Council, which has a stellar reputation looking at innovative solutions to hard problems. Experts from their Digital Forensic Research Lab will work closely with our security, policy and product teams to get Facebook real-time insights and updates on emerging threats and disinformation campaigns from around the world.
This will help increase the number of "eyes and ears" we have working to spot potential abuse on our service -- enabling us to more effectively identify gaps in our systems, preempt obstacles, and ensure that Facebook plays a positive role during elections all around the world. Nathaniel Gleicher : Mr. Gleicher is Head of Cybersecurity Policy at Facebook as shown here Gleicher's belief system, here is what he said in a blog posting on January 17, entitled " Removing Coordinated Inauthentic Behaviour from Russia ": " Today we removed Facebook Pages and accounts for engaging in coordinated inauthentic behavior as part of a network that originated in Russia and operated in the Baltics, Central Asia, the Caucasus, and Central and Eastern European countries.
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The Page administrators and account owners primarily represented themselves as independent news Pages or general interest Pages on topics like weather, travel, sports, economics, or politicians in Romania, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Russia, and Kyrgyzstan.
Despite their misrepresentations of their identities, we found that these Pages and accounts were linked to employees of Sputnik, a news agency based in Moscow, and that some of the Pages frequently posted about topics like anti-NATO sentiment, protest movements, and anti-corruption. That's totally unAmerican not to mention totally without merit! David Recordon : Mr.
If you’re married & you’re on Facebook, you should read this
Recordon lists himself as a "doer" on his Linkedin page as shown here Between March and January , Mr. Digital Service at the White House as you can see here: Please note that prior to his tenure with the federal government, Mr. Recordon was Engineering Director at Facebook. Aneesh Raman : Mr. Meredith Carden : Ms. Carden is currently working on Facebook's News Integrity Partnerships as shown here Joel Benenson: Mr.
Benenson, founder of Benenson Strategy Group , is conducting research for the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative as shown here Remembering that Facebook is now tied to the Atlantic Council who functions as its censor, here is a screen capture that shows the close links between Washington and the Atlantic Council when it comes to leadership:.