
Facebook says it’s hired a forensics team to investigate Cambridge Analytica - aylmao
https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/19/17140118/facebook-investigation-audit-data-breach-cambridge-analytica
======
mindcrash
The BBC aired a documentary about Cambridge Analytica and how Trump's digital
strategy team used Facebook using the information gathered through analytics
to target people.

Evidence this thing exists:
[https://twitter.com/bbcstories/status/896752720522100742](https://twitter.com/bbcstories/status/896752720522100742)

It's been a while, but I am pretty damn sure in this documentary it was
mentioned that due to the amount of money the Trump campaign invested in their
digital strategy efforts people from Facebook were assisting them _on site_ to
make sure everything went smoothly.

And now the same company who at that time happily took Trumps money and gave
the campaign full assistance (and thus being _fully_ aware of the kind of gray
area shit CA was pulling off) is making them look like cyber criminals, likely
to just look "good" (while they actually were just as bad) and virtue signal
the living shit out of this incident.

Amazing.

~~~
IAmEveryone
I have no sympathy for Facebook, but I believe it’s entirely possible to
square these facts: these consultants could have easily helped with ad
management without being privy to the less benign side of the operation.

The Cambridge Analytica campaign seems to also have been separate from the
campaign’s main ad campaign run from the US, which is the one that got th
consultants.

~~~
mindcrash
According to the stuff I saw at least a few data scientists from CA were at
the same location as Trumps digital strategy team in San Antonio, Texas. Which
is the same location at which people from Microsof (although not on location
100% of their time), Facebook, Google and Twitter assisted into making him
POTUS:

"Those staffers, two each from Twitter and Facebook, and one from Google, and
three from Microsoft, joined 12 more digital experts embedded in the campaign
from Cambridge Analytica, the Boston-based data firm which is under
investigation in both the U.S. and abroad, and is funded by Trump benefactor
and billionaire Robert Mercer"

Source: [https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/8xmvkg/trump-campaign-
ha...](https://news.vice.com/en_us/article/8xmvkg/trump-campaign-had-help-
from-8-silicon-valley-staffers)

With all these people in just a small amount of space (because Trump's team
and the office they were located in weren't that big according to the
documentary) I can pretty much guarantee you that they all knew what was going
on back then. Nothing stays secret, especially not in such small
uncompartmentalized workspaces in which people need to work hard and work hard
together.

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camillomiller
Is this gonna affect Facebook’s bottom line in any meaningful way? My five
dollars are on the “hell no” option, unfortunately. Let the newscycle pass and
it’s gonna be just another speedbump noone will recall three months from now.
Looking forward to the staggering yoy revenue growth Facebook will report in
January 2019.

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jsm386
Direct link to announcement: [https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/03/forensic-
audits-cambrid...](https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2018/03/forensic-audits-
cambridge-analytica/)

------
stevenwoo
They could just watch the channel 4 documentary that just aired. As the other
post on the front page now kind of says, they were just using Facebook as
designed to spread disinformation.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _They could just watch the channel 4 documentary that just aired_

Link please?

~~~
faitswulff
Here you go: [https://www.channel4.com/news/cambridge-analytica-
revealed-t...](https://www.channel4.com/news/cambridge-analytica-revealed-
trumps-election-consultants-filmed-saying-they-use-bribes-and-sex-workers-to-
entrap-politicians-investigation)

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m3kw9
People will trust that as much as the next batch of data being sent thru
FaceBook not being sent to 3rd parties. The need the DOJ to do a more fair job

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toufka
Has there (yet) been a public leak of millions of private facebook-like or
gmail-like profiles? Sure emails, sure PII, but ever 50M people's gender and
sexuality linked to their real name leaked to The Pirate Bay?

I'm curious if Facebook might be concerned right now that the raw data might
itself get leaked. This would make yet even _more_ personal what once was only
theoretical or abstract.

------
dom96
I'm watching the Channel 4 News special about this incident and it seems to me
that there is a lot of serious unknowns. But perhaps I am just not up to date
on everything.

Has Facebook released information on what data about friends of friends was
"stolen" by Cambridge Analytica yet? From what I've seen, Facebook has known
about this since 2015, so I assume they have a pretty good idea of this.

