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Facebook's scandals aren't stopping it from making tons of money
We're all well aware that Facebook had a dreadful 2018, and 2019 isn't looking any better, what with the company being plagued by scandals surrounding data privacy and the spread of toxic content on its site. But despite those controversies, Facebook's business has continued to rack up billions of dollars over the past few months, although its user growth has indeed started to slow down a bit. And now we know how Facebook closed out the year, thanks to its Q4 2018 earnings report. Today, the social network giant reported that it earned $16.9 billion in revenue, up 30 percent year-over-year. Monthly active users reached 2.32 billion, up nine percent over a year ago.
Facebook releases an update on its civil rights audit
In May, Facebook agreed to conduct a civil rights audit, and now the company has released an update of its progress. Headed by civil liberties leader Laura Murphy, the audit has so far engaged with dozens of civil rights organizations in order to identify which issues the company should focus on. And in her report, Murphy highlights some of the work that was done this year and what the audit will tackle in 2019.
Facebook reportedly agrees to share an update on its civil rights audit
The civil rights advocacy group of Color of Change released a statement today describing a meeting it had with Facebook leaders regarding a civil rights audit the organization has demanded from the social network since 2016. At the meeting, attended by Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Color of Change President Rashad Robinson, the company agreed to publicly release an update on the audit by the end of the year. "Facebook, like much of Silicon Valley, desperately needs a cultural transformation," Robinson said in a statement. "Leaders must see that addressing the needs of Black users and employees, collaborating with civil rights groups to correct existing issues and rooting out the internal forces hostile to civil rights are essential for the company's future success."
Sheryl Sandberg asked Facebook staff to 'look into' Soros investments
It has been about two weeks since the New York Times published an exposé on Facebook's response to bad press and protests against it over the last couple of years. Since then, an outgoing exec took responsibility for hiring a PR firm, Definers, that had contacted members of the press trying to link anti-Facebook activists to the investor George Soros. Tonight, the New York Times reports that COO Sheryl Sandberg had emailed employees asking them to look into Soros, frequently a target of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. In a statement to the paper Facebook confirmed the investigation and her request, although it claimed that it had begun prior to the email. It said that "Mr. Soros is a prominent investor and we looked into his investments and trading activity related to Facebook. That research was already underway when Sheryl sent an email asking if Mr. Soros had shorted Facebook's stock." Sandberg's request reportedly occurred in January, after Soros made a speech calling for tighter regulation on internet giants like Facebook and Google. In a Facebook post published November 15th, Sandberg said the company was no longer working with Definers, and "I did not know we hired them or about the work they were doing, but I should have. I have great respect for George Soros – and the anti-Semitic conspiracy theories against him are abhorrent." The reported emails don't conflict with that statement, but it did omit reference to the investigation, and activist groups targeted by the PR firm like Freedom from Facebook and Color of Change are asking more questions about the strategy.
Zuckerberg says stepping down at Facebook is 'not the plan'
Once again, there has been a bombshell report about Facebook and once again, execs are doing the rounds on cable news. This time instead of Sheryl Sandberg, it's CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and his tone in a CNN Business interview was not nearly as apologetic as we saw the company earlier this year after news broke about Cambridge Analytica. As we've seen lately, he didn't directly address many of the claims made about Facebook's behavior, but characterized them as generally inaccurate, saying "It is not clear to me at all that the report is right" about the New York Times article that sparked this latest round of criticism.
Once again, Facebook has a lot of explaining to do
Just when you thought things couldn't get worse for Facebook, The New York Times has come out with a bombshell exposé of the company's tumultuous last two years. That, of course, includes its handling (er, mishandling) of the Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal and other controversies, like the lack of transparency around Russian interference on its site leading up to the 2016 US presidential election. The paper says it spoke with more than 50 people, including current and former Facebook employees, who detailed the company's efforts to contain, deny and deflect negative stories that came its way.
Facebook responds to the New York Times' blockbuster exposé
The New York Times recently published a bruising Facebook report saying, among other things, that the social network knew about Russian interference well before it said, feared Trump supporters and lobbied against critics. The nature of the article stunned even jaded tech observers, but now Facebook has issued a point-by-point rebuttal. It denied that it knew about Russian activity as early as spring of 2016, prevented security chief Alex Stamos from looking into it and that it discouraged employees from using iPhones out of spite for Tim Cook's comments.
Facebook is still growing at a slow but steady pace
It feels like for the better part of the past two years, every few months we talk about how Facebook hasn't been having an easy time. In 2018 alone, the company's faced several problems, such as the Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal and, of course, the recent data breach that exposed private data of 29 million Facebook users. While we won't see the effects of the latter until next quarter, if at all, Facebook has kept raking in cash and users despite everything -- even if its growth has slowed down a bit. For Q3 2018, Facebook reports it has grown to 2.27 billion monthly active users, a 10 percent year-over-year increase, which is complemented by $13.78 billion in revenue.
Facebook hires tarnished UK politician to fix its reputation
These days, all Facebook seems to do is lurch from one public relations crisis to a political one, and back again. Consequently, the company has decided to hire a British former politician, Sir Nick Clegg, as VP of Global Affairs and Communications. Clegg will replace Elliot Shrage, who announced he was stepping down from that role earlier this year.
The US government comes for Google, Facebook, and Twitter
Facebook, Twitter, and Google were threatened by lawmakers from three distinct quarters on Wednesday. A leaked email from the largest US telecom lobbying group tells us where this is headed. One threat came during testimony from Facebook's Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter's Jack Dorsey to Congress when Senator Mark Warner told the pair of executives that "Congress is going to have to take action here. The era of the Wild West in social media is coming to an end."
Are Facebook and Twitter scared enough to work together?
The last time a bunch of social media execs testified before congress the hearings ended with US House Representative Ted Lieu (D-CA) calling it a "dumb" and "stupid" sideshow. He said there were more important matters for Congress to be discussing the "content-filtering practices" of internet companies, and that Facebook, Twitter and Google can't have user posts be regulated because of the First Amendment anyway. Still, members of the Senate and House are keen on finding ways for Silicon Valley giants to keep their services safe, particularly from foreign interference and other bad actors trying to create discord among Americans. But rather than get into a battle with Congress over potential federal regulation, which would likely cause some controversy, Facebook and Twitter seem willing to work together on solutions for these issues in order to avoid that path.
Sandberg’s ‘alternative facts’ comment won’t help Facebook’s cause
Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee today, addressing social media's role in election meddling and their platforms' efforts to combat it. When discussing misinformation, Sandberg described Facebook's use of fact checkers, saying that once third-party fact checkers mark a story as false, the platform then shows related articles next to the original in order to provide readers with additional and more factual coverage. But her choice of words was rather telling. "If it's marked as false we dramatically decrease the distribution on our site, we warn you if you're about to share it, we warn you if you have shared it, and importantly we show related articles next to that so people can see alternative facts," she said (emphasis added).
Mark Zuckerberg op-ed describes the election interference 'arms race'
Ahead of Senate hearings that will see Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey testifying about foreign election interference, Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg has chimed in via an op-ed in the Washington Post. While we wait to watch the hearings in the morning, you can have a look at his essay, which is mostly a rehash of things we've been hearing about for months in terms of fighting fake accounts, fact checking hoaxes, tracking influence networks and the efforts it has made around elections in France, Germany, Mexico and Italy. Zuckerberg said that Facebook has strengthened its defenses, but it remains to be seen how that will go over with members of Congress and the public. In closing, the CEO said "It's an arms race, and it will take the combined forces of the U.S. private and public sectors to protect America's democracy from outside interference." Whether or not Facebook has done enough, if there are other weak points allowing for misinformation and propaganda -- as researchers found when they were easily able to buy Google ads for Russian troll-inspired material using rubles and known IRA identities -- it may not matter.
What to expect when Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey testifies to Congress
Nearly five months after Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified before Congress, it is now turn for Twitter boss Jack Dorsey to do the same. On September 5th, he will take the witness stand twice on Capitol Hill, first in front of the Senate Intelligence Committee and then the House Energy and Commerce Committee. Dorsey will be alongside Facebook's chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg for the Intel Committee's "Foreign Influence Operations' Use of Social Media Platforms" hearing, followed by a solo appearance in the Energy and Commerce Committee's own, entitled "Twitter: Transparency and Accountability."
Facebook tells Senate it needs help stopping election interference
Facebook has been scrambling to fight election meddling ahead of the 2018 midterms, but it doesn't want to go alone. The social network has released COO Sheryl Sandberg's prepared testimony ahead of her Senate appearance on September 5th, and she uses the presentation to call for more government help in battling interference from countries like Russia. Facebook's staffers "can't stop interference by ourselves," she said, noting that Facebook doesn't have "all the investigative tools" of government and can't always identify perpetrators or their motivations.
Watch tomorrow's Jack Dorsey congressional hearings right here
Another round of social media congressional hearings is upon us. This time, it's Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's turn, who will be testifying alongside Facebook's Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg before the Senate Intelligence Committee on September 5th. But that hearing, which will focus on foreign election interference, won't be the only one of the day for Dorsey. He's also set to testify alone in a hearing from the House Energy and Commerce Committee entitled "Twitter: Transparency and Accountability." There, he'll be asked questions about how the company's algorithms work to filter out abuse, as well as its decision-making process when it blocks certain content (and accounts) from appearing on its site.
Despite scandals, Facebook is still raking in cash and users
It's no secret that 2018 has been quite a rocky year for Facebook, after controversies over the Cambridge Analytica data privacy scandal and, most recently, its handling of fake news on the platform. But, despite these troubling issues, the company's bottom line hasn't been affected -- it made $12 billion during the last quarter alone. And today, Facebook reported a total revenue of $13.23 billion in Q2 2018, a 42 percent year-over-year increase. Meanwhile, daily and monthly active user numbers are still growing, though they didn't jump by much compared to Q1 2018. Monthly users are now at 2.23 billion, only up 1.54 percent from the last quarter.
Facebook admits it was late on fake news
At the Code Conference today, Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg and CTO Mike Schroepfer faced questions on all of the issues that has plagued the company lately, like the Cambridge Analytica scandal, and the influx of fake news and hate speech. Specifically, Re/Code's Kara Swisher asked them why hasn't anyone been fired for the Cambridge Analytica scandal. "We do fire people," Sandberg answered, though she wouldn't specify that it was related to the scandal. "We don't trot them out and make examples of them."
Fake Mark Zuckerbergs tried to scam Facebook users for cash
A number of Facebook and Instagram accounts have been parading as Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg, tricking vulnerable individuals into sending large amounts of money in order to collect bogus lottery winnings, the New York Times reports. The newspaper describes multiple cases wherein Facebook users were contacted by fake accounts claiming to be Facebook executives offering hundreds of thousands of dollars in supposed winnings. In many cases, the "winners" were asked to send hundreds of dollars in iTunes gift card redemption codes or even thousands of dollars in cash -- delivery fees required for collecting the lottery funds.
Sheryl Sandberg: Facebook has 'thought about' paid subscriptions
When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testified in front of a Senate commission earlier this month, he made a statement that hinted at the company exploring paid subscriptions down the line. He specifically said that they would always offer a free version of Facebook, leaving the door open for other paid versions as well. On today's earnings call, COO Sheryl Sandberg got even more concrete, saying that "we've certainly thought about lots of other forms of monetization including subscriptions, and we'll always continue to consider everything."
