Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#151

Post by rodgerd » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:46 AM UTC

acdc4life wrote: post #69

HNthrow22 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Facebook has no clue what kind of stuff gets posted on their platform, and their AI isn't powerful enough to detect it. The idea that Facebook is causing/enabling such behaviors is ridiculous. I contend as a society we should hold these massive tech orgs (who have more power than most governments) to the standard of moderating the content that's posted to their platforms. They have the money and profits to hire hum…

None of these tech companies have the ability to do that. What you are suggesting would mean the death of every social media company.

Set your location to Germany when you use Twitter.

You'll almost never see far-right content any more.

I'm sorry you've internalized their bullshit, but that's what it is: bullshit. They can do it when it sells ads or stops someone senior going to jail.

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#152

Post by Barrin92 » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:47 AM UTC

o10449366 wrote: post #125

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Attendance proves nothing at all. We've no idea if they are comfortable or not. Many appear to have come to think of it as a necessary evil. Millions of people were eating adulterated food every meal prior to food regulations. Political process and advertising was rife with corruption prior to attempts to instil a semblance of fairness limiting what was allowed and when. Yet people attempted to vote before this.

You're claiming simultaneously that we have no idea whether these users are comfortable or not and that most of them think of it as a necessary evil. Attendance absolutely proves something when it comes to social media. You can't make a comparison between social media and food because one is necessary for survival and one isn't (I'm sure I'm going to invite a ton of comments here on how 'Facebook has become so ubiqui…

>Attendance absolutely proves something when it comes to social media.

Yes, it proves that network effects can force people into bad equilibra. If you think high university costs are harmful for society in the long run, but if you personally don't attend you will incur significant cost in the short run, with nobody cooperating, how do you behave?

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#153

Post by spinach » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:50 AM UTC

techntoke wrote: post #22

Facebook is going to have to allow users to opt out of advertisements entirely for anything to change. You are essentially trading the social features of the site in exchange of you agreeing for them to profile you, decide what you should see based on a private algorithm, and share that information with third parties. Zuckerberg even suggested a while back allowing paid users to opt out, but then this just preys on t…

How else is it supposed to exist if it doesn't have ads? That's a huge part of it's business model. Companies that want to make a huge profit but offer a 'free' product all rely on the back-end manipulation advertising model. Either the product can't be free or they must turn into a non-profit. What other service offers something for free besides a charity? Except Facebook is the opposite of a charity.

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#154

Post by FakeComments » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:51 AM UTC

zapzupnz wrote: post #149

FakeComments wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Okay. None of what you wrote is a response to what I said, beside “well, if it gets bad enough, society will adapt”. You admit that in the current market, those companies are vastly important in a way that can’t change quickly and their acting as censors could turn so bad, it would force a change to the very way we communicate. I think “hellish” is an apt description of “would reshape hundreds of billions to trillion…

> Your vision for society is one in which private companies moderate civic discourse? > None of what you wrote is a response to what I said My post was that there are alternatives to Facebook and Twitter having the monopoly on public discourse, proved it by demonstrating alternative methods by which no one (or two) entities have any such monopoly. You spoke about a "vision for society". Typically when people talk abo…

You have a second vision that had nothing to do with what we were talking about before, which was changing the current system to one where entrenched private interests would be censors — the envisioned change I was responding to.

Your non-sequitur other wishes have nothing to do with that being a hellish vision.

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#155

Post by m0zg » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:52 AM UTC

xupybd wrote: post #75

xupybd wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah we are looking at introducing hate speech laws after the attack. https://www.newsroom.co.nz/2019/04/08/524142/what-will-happe... Many people here don't value free speech even a little bit. I fear where this will lead us.

To show how bad it is here. Our Civil Liberties society doesn't fight for free speech https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/new-zealand/2019/03/there-sho...

Seems like a nation well on its way to becoming a "bad" historical example in a 100 years or less.

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#156

Post by bArray » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:53 AM UTC

> Zuckerberg said incidents like the live streaming of the

> Christchurch mosque attacks were the result of “bad

> actors”; not bad technology and a time delay would disrupt

> the enjoyment of users who broadcast events like birthday

> parties or group hangouts.

In this case, he is 100% correct. Facebook, or social media in general, is a tool. A powerful tool, but a tool nevertheless. Knives for example aren't evil and are important for cooking/cutting, yet there are many knife attacks in London all of the time.

A time delay doesn't solve the problem, the Christchurch terrorist could have pretended to act in some acceptable manner for the checks and then performed the atrocities after passing them (and checked from another account). He could have filmed his drive to the Mosque and discussed the weather, for example, to bypass initial checks.

> “It is a technology which is capable of causing great

> harm,” Edwards told RNZ.

I hope he also advocates for the banning of vehicles, banning of knives - or any other mundane object that causes many deaths a year. Perhaps he also calls for GPS trackers to be put into every knife sold [0]?

> “They are morally bankrupt pathological liars who enable

> genocide (Myanmar), facilitate foreign undermining of

> democratic institutions.

Except they are actively banning people (against their own guidelines on acceptable Facebook use) that could possibly upset left-wing establishments [1]. I don't think Facebook could possibly bend any further to the NZ governments will. I don't think silicon valley could have possibly done any more to try to remove the shooting content [2].

[0] https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/03/14/mp-mocked-sugges...

[1] https://goldfiremedia.net/2019/02/27/censor-sweep-tommy-robi...

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/mar/15/video-of-chris...

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#157

Post by ethbro » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:53 AM UTC

WillPostForFood wrote: post #124

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't have the ability to control your premises, or employ enough security, perhaps you should not be permitted to operate those premises. Unsafe clubs get closed down. They - or any other social media company - don't have a right to exist. If societies around the world conclude they do more harm than good as they currently operate, it's perfectly reasonable to require them to moderate adequately. If they cann…

If you don't have the ability to control your premises, or employ enough security, perhaps you should not be permitted to operate those premises. So we should shut down the mosques in New Zealand because they didn't control their premises and keep the shooter out? Should we shut down banks because they didn't have enough security to keep a bank robber out? You are shifting the blame away from the perpetrator. Every c…

Those other businesses aren't running 40% profit margins.

It's a fair question to ask, "If a company is that profitable and having toxic effects, then why shouldn't it pay some of the cost of addressing its toxic effects?"

The tendency on HN is to say exploitive governments want to tax technology startups.

But we're not talking about technology startups. We're talking about the new old-old ATT.

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#158

Post by o10449366 » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:54 AM UTC

djpilot wrote: post #131

o10449366 wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Facebook already employs tens of thousands of human moderators. What you're really proposing is that every piece of content that's uploaded to any internet website should be manually reviewed and approved by another human. You don't think that's a ridiculous and unrealistic proposition that could be turned into a weapon by bad actors (just like a livestream feature?)?

This is flat out not true. FB doesn't employ 10s of thousands of human moderators. According to a 3-month old article, $FB supposedly employs 7,500 moderators [0], though it's unclear what constitutes "employment" in this case. Probably a salary of less than $5k/yr. Are there really thouhsands of content moderators pulling up to FBHQ in Menlo Park 5 days a week? I don't think so, no. [0] https://www.inc.com/christine…

"By the end of 2018, in response to criticism of the prevalence of violent and exploitative content on the social network, Facebook had more than 30,000 employees working on safety and security — about half of whom were content moderators." [0]

That number has only increased in recent months and will likely continue to increase in the near future. Not all of them are designated content moderators, it's true, so technically they likely only employ one or two "10s of thousands", but I'm mainly addressing the misconception in the thread that Facebook is "doing nothing." That's a significant amount of moderators. Is it enough? No, but to claim or pretend that they aren't actively doing anything is facetious and something I've been seeing more and more of on HN lately.

[0] https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/25/18229714/cognizant-facebo...

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#159

Post by antpls » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 4:59 AM UTC

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #100

acdc4life wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

None of these tech companies have the ability to do that. What you are suggesting would mean the death of every social media company.

If you don't have the ability to control your premises, or employ enough security, perhaps you should not be permitted to operate those premises. Unsafe clubs get closed down. They - or any other social media company - don't have a right to exist. If societies around the world conclude they do more harm than good as they currently operate, it's perfectly reasonable to require them to moderate adequately. If they cann…

> The question then becomes who decides what's acceptable content, the only answer is regulations and legislation for this otherwise for-profit tech giants will be the ones who decide and they're more concerned with user-engagement than far reaching detached societal implications.

What about this : all content is potential knowledge and should be made available. That way no one get to decide what is "acceptable content". At the end of the day, the laws still forbid anyone to kill people, content or not.

A good read is : https://freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-net/freedom-net-2018...

Re: Facebook are 'morally bankrupt liars' says New Zealand's privacy commissioner

#160

Post by RandomTisk » Mon, Apr 08, 2019, 5:05 AM UTC

NeedMoreTea wrote: post #140

WillPostForFood wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't have the ability to control your premises, or employ enough security, perhaps you should not be permitted to operate those premises. So we should shut down the mosques in New Zealand because they didn't control their premises and keep the shooter out? Should we shut down banks because they didn't have enough security to keep a bank robber out? You are shifting the blame away from the perpetrator. Every c…

Let's take it to the absurd. I am NOT shifting any blame from the perpetrator. I am placing additional blame on a medium that isn't willing to exercise adequate restraint or control. A bank undoubtedly has security measures in place to prevent robbery, if they don't bother, they won't last long. Nonetheless, there are regulations on what may and may not be done for public spaces, how crowded they may be to pass fire…

Why stop at Facebook? The GoPro or iPhone he used should have caught it before it even reached facebook. The ISP should have caught it too. Lock them all up? How about the pavement the killer walked on, it should have swallowed him, let's sue the city for not designing shooter eating sidewalks?

You're looking to go down a ridiculous road imo.