
Labour HQ used Facebook ads to deceive Jeremy Corbyn during election campaign - stevemoy
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/news/labour-hq-used-facebook-ads-to-deceive-jeremy-corbyn-during-election-campaign-grlx75c27
======
hellllllllooo
Wow. We've seen people microtarget leaders and CEOs with ads on Facebook to
get a job.

[http://twicsy-blog.tumblr.com/post/174063770074/how-i-
target...](http://twicsy-blog.tumblr.com/post/174063770074/how-i-targeted-the-
reddit-ceo-with-facebook-ads-to)

This is a case where microtargeting the boss hopefully cost them their job.
This is completely unethical.

~~~
madrox
I don't disagree, per se, but it's interesting that we have no problem with
leaders of corporations personalizing ads for individuals while we are
bothered when the position is reversed.

~~~
infogulch
More than anything I think it's a more tangible argument for how
microtargeting can go south. Most people are ok with the concept of
advertising in general, and microtargeting feels like a small step from normal
ads. "Yeah I get it, people want to sell me shit, what's the big deal?" _This_
is the big deal.

Advertising's purpose is to infect your mind and trick it into thinking what
the ad-buyer wants. In the past it wasn't as big of a deal, advertisers are
less likely to use direct lies or manipulations if the audience is big: they
can get backlash, some tricks have the opposite effect on some people, etc.
Now that they can target individuals every trick in the book is fair game.

Now, if you talk to someone about these problems, they'll usually say
something like "oh well it might affect other people, but ads don't affect
_me_." Or "why would they care that much about _me_?" Guess what, if a
politician can be be targeted and manipulated, a disgruntled coworker can
target you, _your ex_ can target you.

~~~
B1FF_PSUVM
> This is the big deal.

I'd argue that the whole modern western political system came out of
advertising (as first allowed by the printing press). That was a big deal ...

------
AngryData
Just another example on why marketing and advertisement is a scourge upon
society, it is far to easy to manipulate from the background without oversight
or any ethical or moral considerations and is known to be highly effective at
making people act against even their own self interests.

~~~
coliveira
Advertisement is also a way to buy support in the media. For example, in the
aftermath of the oil spill on the Gulf of Mexico, BP showered money on TV and
magazines. The real reason they did that was to tone down the coverage,
especially in a moment where TV was deeply in need of advertisement money due
to the big depression of 2008.

~~~
neka
Also case in point with Facebook's current PR campaign trying to soften the
blow for their recent fallout. It's said that these adverts are placed with
the threat to pull them if any unfavourable articles are published.

------
rossdavidh
Wow, a left-of-center party more worried about change from within than they
are about losing the election to the right. What a bizarre and unprecedented
thing. Thankfully that could never happen in my home country, the USA.

~~~
user982
It helps that you do not have a real left-of-center party to begin with.

~~~
Sharlin
I presume the GP was being sarcastic and referred to Clinton vs Sanders.

------
andy_ppp
So they ran ultra left wing ads micro targeted at Corbyn and similar
supporters so these people thought everyone was seeing them. I really wonder
if micro targeting should just be switched off for everyone during political
campaigns. It allows political parties to do exactly this, be literally all
things to all people rather than genuine in their messaging.

How can we educate people this is happening? I’m certain it’s hugely effective
and undermines democracy in a way newspapers or TV could never have dreamed
of.

~~~
fareesh
If you can speak to me one on one and tell me why I should vote for you, and
you convince me - then you deserve my vote. Microtargeting allows you to do
that at scale.

If I care about a certain issue and you advertise to me in a way that matches
up to the things I care about, and present ideas that I agree with, then you
are campaigning correctly.

If a politician saw that I cared about the environment and argued for
upholding the Paris agreement - that would not win my vote, because I don't
think the Paris agreement is a good solution to that problem. In this case,
they lose my vote.

If they see that I care about income inequality but tell me that they will
solve it by taxing the rich, I don't agree with that either - so they lose my
vote.

Microtargeting is a tool just like the newspaper op-ed or the campaign
commercial or the stump speech. Banning it because people are using it well is
like taking away the stairs because some people use wheelchairs.

~~~
andy_ppp
What seems to constantly happen is that we are instead served up the porridge
that’s specifically for us while we don’t see the whole picture and what _all
the other people_ have also been promised.

What I’m saying is that the narrative of a manifesto or even what a political
party stands for is corrupted by being “all things to all people” in their
messaging.

~~~
makomk
I don't think anyone has managed to pull this off, simply because social media
is also a very effective way of broadcasting the fact that someone is trying
to do so. People get pissed off when they think someone is trying to pull a
fast one on them, and they feel smart when they think they've outwitted them,
and both of those things make for effective viral content. This even happens
when the claim isn't true; for instance, there's a perennial viral news hoax
about the Washington Post running opposite headlines in Trump-supporting and
Clinton-supporting areas that keeps popping up despite having a Snopes
debunking.

If the social media networks clamp down on ordinary people's ability to spread
political messages this might work. Which I guess could happen, given the
pressure for them to do so.

(The Trump campaign seems to have sensibly not even tried this and just used
micro-targetting as a way of reducing the cost of getting their message in
front of the people who're interested in it. If people outside the target
group saw their message organically, well, that was basically just free
advertising.)

~~~
andy_ppp
TFA is about abusing micro targeting to convince a group (in this case the
Labour Leadership) of something that wasn’t true. I don’t see how you could
have a more direct example of something you’re saying doesn’t exist.

~~~
makomk
TFA is about someone doing this to, what, probably a few dozen people? The
more people you try a stunt like this on, the bigger the chance that one of
the people receiving one message will talk to one of the people receiving the
other message.

------
addicted
Btw, for all those who like to step in other aritcles about the concerns with
social media, to tell us how it's just like TV was a few decades ago, this
article shows why it absolutely is not.

The persoinal targeting provided by FB and the like makes it an entirely
different beast from past experiences.

~~~
Eridrus
It's not like TV, it's like mail advertising, which was starting to get
attention for its lack of transparency before the 2016 cycle got everyone
hyper attuned to Facebook's issues.

~~~
ardy42
> It's not like TV, it's like mail advertising

Exactly. Targeted advertising is the _junk mail_ that stuffs your mailbox and
the _spam_ that stuffs your inbox (or would, without massive technical
mitigations). It's not the ads you see in a magazine or while watching TV.

------
GreeniFi
This is disturbing for the following reasons: 1\. It alerts us to the
possibility of fake political adverts. Do I (hypothetically)see an ad
purporting to be a Tory ad promising something that will damage me, placed by
a non-Tory actor? 2\. Are unknown actors placing adverts which cause discord
and dislike? 3\. How do we solve this problem? Where FB is not regulated it
will be impossible to knowingly audit the materials on its platform. 4\. Given
FB’s lobbying power, is regulation even possible?

~~~
Gargoyle
Fake advertising for the purpose of creating discord is as old as political
advertising.

I had a friend run for state legislature in the 1990s, his opponent sent
people around targeted neighborhoods passing out fake flyers for my friend's
campaign. They used his name and photo, but attributed positions he did not
hold to him.

I imagine before cheap printing, it was gossip. I'm sure it's been the case
since democracy started.

~~~
eeeuo
People often suggest that the Internet is a problem in terms of
disinformation, but I'd argue in many cases that the Internet actually helps.

In pre-Internet days, it was difficult to get someone's views in their own
words, especially in real-time. All information was filtered through various
sources before being passed onto the consumer. Now, it's straightforward to
check their website, or their twitter, or their youtube.

This, of course, is not perfect and requires a root-of-trust involving Google
and DNS, but I'd certainly take that tradeoff versus Guy On The Street
asserting things.

~~~
y4mi
It's called agree of misinformation because it's become increasingly easy to
produce convincing fake footage.

It's entirely possible to fake a real-time video interview for instance using
voice synthesis and mapping the face of your target upon your face. It's
frighteningly convincing.

I.e.
[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AmUC4m6w1wo](https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=AmUC4m6w1wo)

~~~
eeeuo
I don't think that footage is frighteningly convincing.

It's pretty good, but not difficult to tell that it's not real. The bridge
between pretty good and perfect when doing this type of thing is a very, very
difficult problem.

It also requires _substantial_ amounts of high quality, up close footage of
the person. This may be work for major politicans, but is much more difficult
for the vast majority of people.

I don't disagree that it will become more of a problem in the future, and in
many cases "pretty good" will be sufficient, but I think people are
overstating how much of a problem it will be.

~~~
y4mi
It's frightening because this is a the work if students with consumer
hardware.

Video material can be produced at will if a wealthy nation or corporatiom
wants it and the model will be significantly better if they train it on
specialized hardware.

I don't think that the average person has to worry about his face being
stolen. I think that it's possible to produce extremely good footage if
somebody is sufficiently motivated to fund a smear campaign. It won't hold up
in court, but it doesn't have to either.

------
keithpeter
[https://www.facebook.com/rsaeventsofficial/videos/1986125631...](https://www.facebook.com/rsaeventsofficial/videos/1986125631409355/)

The authors of the book mentioned in _The Times_ article did a
speech/interview at the RSA on Thursday, video above.

I don't use Facebook and therefore can't log in, but I would imagine that
Corbyn was aware of the campaign's general impact through wider relationships
(trade unions, Momentum, family members, sparring partners in Parliament &c)

------
cozzyd
Next you'll have morning tv shows specifically targeting world leaders who
watch them.

~~~
toomuchtodo
If you want to get meta, John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight has bought ads during
Fox And Friends to counter the show’s influence on the president.

[http://thehill.com/homenews/media/360076-john-oliver-to-
snea...](http://thehill.com/homenews/media/360076-john-oliver-to-sneak-info-
to-trump-through-fox-friends-ads)

EDIT: Oof, tough croud.

------
leoc
This may be the second most cyberpunk thing to happen in the past short while,
after the rise of virtual reality being impeded by people buying all the video
cards to pan for virtual gold of course.

------
mc32
This pretty interesting, not only did his campaign fool him, they fooled the
people voting for Corbyn —they made him appear more centrist than he actually
was for, they feared, if they broadcast his real intended message to all, it
might have turned voters away from his views.

~~~
mark212
One could very plausibly argue that the second point (making the candidate
more electable / centrist) has been the entire point of political campaigning
since the ancient Greeks. Politicians have been lying to voters (or more
charitably, putting their best foot forward) since the very beginning of
democracy.

Usually the candidate is in on it. Remarkably, Corbyn isn’t or wasn’t so they
had to pull this stunt.

------
Rjevski
Yet another example of why advertising is cancer and should be eradicated.

------
downandout
From the article:

 _”When the leader of a political party can be tricked in such fashion by his
own officials, voters themselves stand little chance.”_

This event does not support the conclusion that social media ads are effective
at “tricking voters”. These ads weren’t even shown to voters. Employees simply
microtargeted their boss to convince him that the ads were running.

The idea that social media ads are somehow effective at brainwashing people
into switching sides has been a clickbait staple among journalists the last
few years, but it is wholly unproven. If they want to sell this narrative,
they’ll certainly need do it more convincingly than they did here.

~~~
yawaramin
I think it supports the conclusion very well. If you can microtarget ads at
segments of voters, you can find a way to tell different types of people
exactly what they want to hear. You can quite effectively prey on their fears
and weaknesses, pit them against each other–divide and conquer.

Facebook has long promised more visibility for users into ads, and that would
go a long way to fighting this kind of trickery ... if it ever materialises.

~~~
repolfx
And what makes you think you know the personal fears and weaknesses of every
single voter, or that you can trivially flip votes by making ads about them?
After all, _in theory_ politicians are actually meant to implement manifestos,
and if they are telling everyone different messages that'll get picked up
immediately once people start debating the election down their local drinking
hole.

The idea that you can buy elections through advertising is a typical position
of the left (and these days, by extension, of journalists). Recall the huge
fuss Obama and the Democrats kicked up when campaign spending limits were
removed by the Supreme Court? Obama was even talking about a constitutional
amendment. Then Hillary outspent Trump 2:1 on advertising and still lost. They
disproved their own thesis.

------
nailer
Imagine if it was the post. The campaign managers could post far left
pamphlets to Jeremy Corbyn's house and select journalists, and send mainstream
ones to most houses. Would we see this as an error in the postal system, or
simply another issue of dishonesty?

------
Uhhrrr
Could one microtarget NSA and DHS employees in this fashion?

------
elorant
So how exactly microtargetting works? They target his interests? Or just
import emails and hope they match the ones they provided?

~~~
corobo
> micro-targeting Facebook adverts at the leader and his closest aides

I'm guessing they created a new target list by uploading enough peoples' email
addresses to get past Facebook's minimum list length. I don't know how many
that is but when I last had a look at it a couple years back the minimum was
20

~~~
Rjevski
I think they raised that limit recently, but again nothing prevents you from
creating lots of fake profiles just to get past that limit, then targeting all
those profiles + the real user you want to target.

~~~
pertymcpert
Wait, what? You can target someone using their email address?

~~~
detaro
Yes: [https://www.facebook.com/business/a/custom-
audiences](https://www.facebook.com/business/a/custom-audiences)

------
trhway
i think microtargetting criteria should be disclosed the same way as who paid
for the ad, be it commercial or political, doesn't matter.

"This ad targeting filters: 'white, male, xenophobe', paid for by Russian
government"

~~~
PunchTornado
what makes you think white males are more likely to be xenophobes?

~~~
detaro
they are not saying that.

------
frabbit
Here is a non-paywalled report on the same topic from another source:
[https://inews.co.uk/news/labour-staff-deceived-corbyn-
facebo...](https://inews.co.uk/news/labour-staff-deceived-corbyn-facebook/)

------
NeedMoreTea
I'm fascinated to see the apparently limitless efforts that both the media and
his own party went to in order to brand Corbyn as an extreme and dangerous
left winger and undermine his progress.

His policies were comparable to, and sometimes to the right of, those of the
SDP. The SDP being the right of the Labour party who split in the 1980s and
later merged with the Liberals to give today's LibDems.

He was more of the fringe in his youth. So were quite a lot of people, current
politicians, even Blairites included. Peter Hain (anti-apartheid and gay
rights) and David Blunkett (Socialist Republic of South Yorkshire[0]) spring
to mind as having had far more activist and strident roots than Corbyn.
Blunkett went on to be a Home Secretary the right of the Tory party would have
been proud of.

Edit: Nowhere am I _advocating_ his policies, why the downvotes?

[0]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Republic_of_South_Yo...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialist_Republic_of_South_Yorkshire)

~~~
crdoconnor
Most of the Blairites had deep links to elite establishment institutions
(think tanks, global nonprofits) and industry (media, PR, finance, etc.). That
formed the mainstay of their power while Corbyn's power base was grass roots
(e.g. Momentum), left wing activist networks and unions.

Ultimately it wasn't really about policy for the rebel MPs, it was about
seeing the main source of their power undermined. There isn't much of a career
left for the Blairites under Corbyn.

Lots of corporate groups allied with the PLP hate his policies though. Richard
Branson with his rail franchise and attempts to set up an American style HMO
is obviously no fan, for example.

~~~
NeedMoreTea
You're entirely right, of course. It's the schadenfreude of watching everyone
framing him as some sort of neo Trotskyite.

Blairites have little career under any leader until memories have faded and
there's another tipping point like Black Monday that brought them in in the
first place. Brexit looks like it could easily cause one of those, going on
current negotiations, so perhaps they won't be waiting too long.

------
mkempe
From a sporting (British?) point of view, it's a brilliant move.

Other than that it's profoundly dishonest, and one has to wonder who they
consider as their true enemy.

~~~
mkempe
Whoever down-voted this does not understand sports, nor the British love of
sports and betting. Maybe read some P.G. Wodehouse to understand and lighten
up.

------
adamnemecek
Programming people seems to be the next frontier of programming.

~~~
mygo
crooks and con men have been doing as such long before digital computers.

~~~
adamnemecek
Social engineering is more two sided. You are trying to get something out of
these people, like something very concrete. This is more propaganda.

~~~
enraged_camel
Propaganda also may try to get things out of people: consent, votes, etc.

------
pasbesoin
Paywall stops me from getting past the top. But, just wow.

If it accurately reflects what happened, well, they're going to have to
designate a new category of shitstorm.

One that, I hope, sucks in FB and forces some true accounting and reckoning,
not just of this circumstance but as a fundamental part of the platform and
business practices.

~~~
superflyguy
In many instances, such as here, they don't make you verify an email sign up.
Always worth a try. For grins I always make up an email address at the site's
own domain.

------
bryanrasmussen
huh we need a new version of the GDPR already it seems. Unfortunately it won't
help Britain.

~~~
detaro
What do you think should it regulate that currently isn't?

~~~
albertgoeswoof
Perhaps we should be regulating marketing? It clearly doesn't serve the public
interest to allow micro-targeting at this level, particularly in political
situations.

------
PunchTornado
I'm confused. Jeremy Corbyn could have clicked on the button "why do I see
this ad" and find out he was targeted.

~~~
raesene9
What makes you think that non-technical people would think to do that? It's
not exactly common knowledge.

Even the idea of that ads can be targeted this tightly isn't common knowledge
outside of technical circles.

------
sjclemmy
Is Jeremy Corbin on Facebook?

Edit: it’s a serious question. He may have a presence but is it actually him?

~~~
maym86
Yes.

~~~
oh_sigh
Is it he himself or aides, pr/comms people etc?

~~~
noobermin
The article does say it's him and his close aides.

