fbpx
  • Latest
  • Trending
Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

3 months ago
The Death of Privacy In America

The Death of Privacy In America

3 weeks ago
America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

3 weeks ago
When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

3 months ago
Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

3 months ago
A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

3 months ago
Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

5 months ago
There’s Something About Mary

There’s Something About Mary

6 months ago
End Of An Era

End Of An Era

7 months ago
The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

8 months ago
Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

8 months ago
Mary, Covered In Roses

Mary, Covered In Roses

12 months ago
Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

Police Detectives Charged With Lying About Bar Fight In North Wildwood

1 year ago
  • About
  • Privacy
  • Subscribe
  • Contact
  • Login
  • Register
60 °f
Middle Township
61 ° Thu
68 ° Fri
68 ° Sat
66 ° Sun
The Standard
  • Home
    • All
    • Business
    • Culture
    • Education
    • Environment
    • Health
    • Housing
    • Immigration
    • Justice
    • Letters
    • Local
    • Media
    • Military
    • National
    • New Jersey
    • Opinion
    • Politics
    • Satire
    The Death of Privacy In America

    The Death of Privacy In America

    America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

    America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

    Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

    Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

    When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

    When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

    Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

    Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

    A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

    A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

    Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

    Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

    There’s Something About Mary

    There’s Something About Mary

    End Of An Era

    End Of An Era

    Trending Tags

    • Politics
      The Death of Privacy In America

      The Death of Privacy In America

      America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

      America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

      Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

      Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

      When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

      When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

      Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

      Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

      A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

      A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

      End Of An Era

      End Of An Era

      Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

      Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

      Rep Jeff Van Drew Calls For Fencing To Be Removed Despite Threats To Capitol

      Rep Jeff Van Drew Calls For Fencing To Be Removed Despite Threats To Capitol

      Democrats Look To Regain A Foothold in Middle Township With Quanette Vasser-McNeal

      Democrats Look To Regain A Foothold in Middle Township With Quanette Vasser-McNeal

      Trending Tags

      • politics
    • Justice
      There’s Something About Mary

      There’s Something About Mary

      Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

      Police Detectives Charged With Lying About Bar Fight In North Wildwood

      Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

      Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

      South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

      South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

      New Jersey Man Steals Police Car, Fatally Shot After Chase

      New Jersey Man Steals Police Car, Fatally Shot After Chase

      “This Political Climate Got My Brother Killed”: Officer Brian Sicknick Died Defending the Capitol. His Family Waits for Answers.

      “This Political Climate Got My Brother Killed”: Officer Brian Sicknick Died Defending the Capitol. His Family Waits for Answers.

      Florida Man Who Went Viral For Stealing Podium Identified

      Florida Man Who Went Viral For Stealing Podium Identified

      Defund The Police Was A Raging Success And Everyone Missed It

      Defund The Police Was A Raging Success And Everyone Missed It

      Non-Violence Isn’t A Just Moral Imperative, It’s A Superior Strategy

      Non-Violence Isn’t A Just Moral Imperative, It’s A Superior Strategy

      The Future Of The Supreme Court

      The Future Of The Supreme Court

      Trending Tags

      • Justice
    • Business
      When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

      When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

      Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

      Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

      Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

      Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

      The Power Of The People

      The Power Of The People

      Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

      Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

      It’s Not The End Of The World, But You Can See It From Here

      It’s Not The End Of The World, But You Can See It From Here

      You Are Not Welcome Here

      You Are Not Welcome Here

      Trending Tags

      • Environment
        Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

        Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

        New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

        New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

        Jackson Park Project A Threat To Clean Water

        Jackson Park Project A Threat To Clean Water

        Fixin Things Till They’re Broke

        Fixin Things Till They’re Broke

        Trending Tags

        • Education
          Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

          Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

          A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

          A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

          Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

          Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

          Gold, Lies, And Genocide In The New World

          Gold, Lies, And Genocide In The New World

          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

          The Covid Kids Are Alright

          The Covid Kids Are Alright

          The Problem With The Pledge Of Allegiance

          The Problem With The Pledge Of Allegiance

          A Boat Full Of Holes

          A Boat Full Of Holes

          Why I Don’t Worry About My Kids Falling Behind

          Why I Don’t Worry About My Kids Falling Behind

          Any Plan To Reopen Schools This Fall Is Irresponsible And Negligent

          Any Plan To Reopen Schools This Fall Is Irresponsible And Negligent

          Trending Tags

          • Education
        • Housing
          There’s Something About Mary

          There’s Something About Mary

          Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

          Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

          Mary, Covered In Roses

          Mary, Covered In Roses

          Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

          Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

          Let the Voters Decide

          Cape May’s Untouchables

          The Cost Of Homelessness in Cape May County

          The Cost Of Homelessness in Cape May County

          The Myth Of American Justice: Falling Through The Cracks Part Two

          Falling Through The Cracks: Part One

          Falling Through The Cracks: Part One

          Invisible Walls

          Invisible Walls

        • Culture
          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

          There’s Something About Mary

          There’s Something About Mary

          The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

          The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

          What Your Ring Tone Says About You

          What Your Ring Tone Says About You

          Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

          Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

          A View Of Goshen In Winter

          A View Of Goshen In Winter

          New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

          New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

          Peepers And Pizza: Spring Comes To New Jersey

          Peepers And Pizza: Spring Comes To New Jersey

          The Power Of The People

          The Power Of The People

          Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

          Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

          Trending Tags

          • Sports

            Trending Tags

            • Health
              America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

              America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

              Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

              Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

              There’s Something About Mary

              There’s Something About Mary

              Mary, Covered In Roses

              Mary, Covered In Roses

              Autism Awareness Day

              Autism Awareness Day

              Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

              Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

              You’ve Been Fully Vaccinated, Now What?

              You’ve Been Fully Vaccinated, Now What?

              The Disney Queue Of Vaccinations

              The Disney Queue Of Vaccinations

              It’s Going To Get Worse

              It’s Going To Get Worse

              Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

              Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

              Trending Tags

              • Healthcare
            • Opinion
              The Death of Privacy In America

              The Death of Privacy In America

              Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

              Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

              South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

              South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

              We Need Amy Kennedy Now

              An Open Letter To Congressman Van Drew

              Donald Trump Must Be Held To Account For His Crimes

              Donald Trump Must Be Held
              To Account For His Crimes

              All Our Sons

              All Our Sons

              It’s Not Enough For Joe Biden To Simply Be Human

              It’s Not Enough For Joe Biden
              To Simply Be Human

              We Have To Stop Trusting Our Leaders To Do The Right Thing

              We Have To Stop Trusting Our Leaders To Do The Right Thing

              The Godless Piety Of American Idealism As Reality Television

              The Godless Piety Of American Idealism As Reality Television

              Why We Can’t Talk About It

              Why We Can’t Talk About It

              Trending Tags

              No Result
              View All Result
              • Home
                • All
                • Business
                • Culture
                • Education
                • Environment
                • Health
                • Housing
                • Immigration
                • Justice
                • Letters
                • Local
                • Media
                • Military
                • National
                • New Jersey
                • Opinion
                • Politics
                • Satire
                The Death of Privacy In America

                The Death of Privacy In America

                America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

                Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

                There’s Something About Mary

                There’s Something About Mary

                End Of An Era

                End Of An Era

                Trending Tags

                • Politics
                  The Death of Privacy In America

                  The Death of Privacy In America

                  America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                  America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                  Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                  Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                  When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                  When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                  Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                  Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                  A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                  A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                  End Of An Era

                  End Of An Era

                  Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

                  Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

                  Rep Jeff Van Drew Calls For Fencing To Be Removed Despite Threats To Capitol

                  Rep Jeff Van Drew Calls For Fencing To Be Removed Despite Threats To Capitol

                  Democrats Look To Regain A Foothold in Middle Township With Quanette Vasser-McNeal

                  Democrats Look To Regain A Foothold in Middle Township With Quanette Vasser-McNeal

                  Trending Tags

                  • politics
                • Justice
                  There’s Something About Mary

                  There’s Something About Mary

                  Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

                  Police Detectives Charged With Lying About Bar Fight In North Wildwood

                  Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

                  Middle Police Arrest Suspect In Connection With Stolen Guns in Cape May Court House

                  South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

                  South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

                  New Jersey Man Steals Police Car, Fatally Shot After Chase

                  New Jersey Man Steals Police Car, Fatally Shot After Chase

                  “This Political Climate Got My Brother Killed”: Officer Brian Sicknick Died Defending the Capitol. His Family Waits for Answers.

                  “This Political Climate Got My Brother Killed”: Officer Brian Sicknick Died Defending the Capitol. His Family Waits for Answers.

                  Florida Man Who Went Viral For Stealing Podium Identified

                  Florida Man Who Went Viral For Stealing Podium Identified

                  Defund The Police Was A Raging Success And Everyone Missed It

                  Defund The Police Was A Raging Success And Everyone Missed It

                  Non-Violence Isn’t A Just Moral Imperative, It’s A Superior Strategy

                  Non-Violence Isn’t A Just Moral Imperative, It’s A Superior Strategy

                  The Future Of The Supreme Court

                  The Future Of The Supreme Court

                  Trending Tags

                  • Justice
                • Business
                  When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                  When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                  Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

                  Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

                  Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

                  Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

                  The Power Of The People

                  The Power Of The People

                  Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

                  Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

                  It’s Not The End Of The World, But You Can See It From Here

                  It’s Not The End Of The World, But You Can See It From Here

                  You Are Not Welcome Here

                  You Are Not Welcome Here

                  Trending Tags

                  • Environment
                    Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

                    Strong Grassroots Opposition Continues To Plague NESE Pipeline’s Fifth Attempt

                    New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

                    New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

                    Jackson Park Project A Threat To Clean Water

                    Jackson Park Project A Threat To Clean Water

                    Fixin Things Till They’re Broke

                    Fixin Things Till They’re Broke

                    Trending Tags

                    • Education
                      Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                      Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                      A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                      A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                      Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

                      Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

                      Gold, Lies, And Genocide In The New World

                      Gold, Lies, And Genocide In The New World

                      Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                      Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                      The Covid Kids Are Alright

                      The Covid Kids Are Alright

                      The Problem With The Pledge Of Allegiance

                      The Problem With The Pledge Of Allegiance

                      A Boat Full Of Holes

                      A Boat Full Of Holes

                      Why I Don’t Worry About My Kids Falling Behind

                      Why I Don’t Worry About My Kids Falling Behind

                      Any Plan To Reopen Schools This Fall Is Irresponsible And Negligent

                      Any Plan To Reopen Schools This Fall Is Irresponsible And Negligent

                      Trending Tags

                      • Education
                    • Housing
                      There’s Something About Mary

                      There’s Something About Mary

                      Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

                      Your Objections To Development Are Counter-Productive

                      Mary, Covered In Roses

                      Mary, Covered In Roses

                      Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

                      Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

                      Let the Voters Decide

                      Cape May’s Untouchables

                      The Cost Of Homelessness in Cape May County

                      The Cost Of Homelessness in Cape May County

                      The Myth Of American Justice: Falling Through The Cracks Part Two

                      Falling Through The Cracks: Part One

                      Falling Through The Cracks: Part One

                      Invisible Walls

                      Invisible Walls

                    • Culture
                      America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                      America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                      There’s Something About Mary

                      There’s Something About Mary

                      The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

                      The Shocking Kindness Of Ted Lasso

                      What Your Ring Tone Says About You

                      What Your Ring Tone Says About You

                      Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

                      Award-Winning Children’s Author Greg Pizzoli Planning A Virtual Visit To Cape May

                      A View Of Goshen In Winter

                      A View Of Goshen In Winter

                      New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

                      New Female Snow Leopard Arrives In Cape May County

                      Peepers And Pizza: Spring Comes To New Jersey

                      Peepers And Pizza: Spring Comes To New Jersey

                      The Power Of The People

                      The Power Of The People

                      Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

                      Your Misplaced Loyalty Is Hurting Your Business

                      Trending Tags

                      • Sports

                        Trending Tags

                        • Health
                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

                          Get Vaxxed If You Want To Play Indoors

                          There’s Something About Mary

                          There’s Something About Mary

                          Mary, Covered In Roses

                          Mary, Covered In Roses

                          Autism Awareness Day

                          Autism Awareness Day

                          Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

                          Code Blue Is No April Fool’s Joke

                          You’ve Been Fully Vaccinated, Now What?

                          You’ve Been Fully Vaccinated, Now What?

                          The Disney Queue Of Vaccinations

                          The Disney Queue Of Vaccinations

                          It’s Going To Get Worse

                          It’s Going To Get Worse

                          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                          Trending Tags

                          • Healthcare
                        • Opinion
                          The Death of Privacy In America

                          The Death of Privacy In America

                          Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

                          Death And Taxes: The Right’s Last Stand

                          South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

                          South Jersey’s Sanctuary City Designations Are A Haven For Violent Extremists

                          We Need Amy Kennedy Now

                          An Open Letter To Congressman Van Drew

                          Donald Trump Must Be Held To Account For His Crimes

                          Donald Trump Must Be Held
                          To Account For His Crimes

                          All Our Sons

                          All Our Sons

                          It’s Not Enough For Joe Biden To Simply Be Human

                          It’s Not Enough For Joe Biden
                          To Simply Be Human

                          We Have To Stop Trusting Our Leaders To Do The Right Thing

                          We Have To Stop Trusting Our Leaders To Do The Right Thing

                          The Godless Piety Of American Idealism As Reality Television

                          The Godless Piety Of American Idealism As Reality Television

                          Why We Can’t Talk About It

                          Why We Can’t Talk About It

                          Trending Tags

                          • About
                          • Privacy
                          • Subscribe
                          • Contact
                          No Result
                          View All Result
                          The Standard
                          No Result
                          View All Result
                          Home Media

                          Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                          byProPublica
                          3 months ago
                          inMedia, National, Politics
                          Reading Time: 7 mins read
                          16
                          0
                          Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                          Photo by Colin Lloyd on Unsplash

                          14
                          SHARES
                          20
                          VIEWS
                          Share on FacebookShare on TwitterEmail this story!

                          Using Facebook’s Own Data to Understand the Platform’s Role in Jan. 6

                          by Brooke Stephenson


                          ProPublica is a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative newsroom. Sign up for The Big Story newsletter to receive stories like this one in your inbox.

                          Imagine you’re a journalist and you receive a collection of tens of millions of posts from more than 100,000 Facebook groups. You think there’s got to be a story — maybe several — in that cache. But how do you find it?

                          A team of reporters from ProPublica and the Washington Post was faced with just such a problem in June, when the newsrooms obtained a unique dataset on Facebook groups compiled by CounterAction, a firm that studies online disinformation.

                          Computational journalist Jeff Kao and reporter Craig Silverman from ProPublica, along with Jeremy B. Merrill and Craig Timberg from The Washington Post, found that between Election Day 2020 and the Jan. 6 siege of the Capitol, Facebook groups exploded with at least 650,000 posts attacking the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s victory.

                          The four journalists’ reporting provides some of the clearest evidence yet that Facebook was an important source of misinformation that led to the Jan. 6 attack. Here’s a look at how they did it.

                          Reporters started with a collection of data on public Facebook groups CounterAction had been monitoring because members had posted links to websites with a strong connection to U.S. politics, or because the groups had members in common with other groups CounterAction was already monitoring. (The dataset did not include private Facebook groups, which are closed to everyone except their members.) This included up to 18 months’ worth of posts from each group. The dataset was so massive, a personal computer simply couldn’t process it; the reporting team had to run its analyses on the cloud.

                          Reporters initially just wanted to know what the data could tell them about how Facebook was treating political groups on its platform. They consulted with experts and sources, then analyzed the dataset in various ways, looking for patterns. As the summer of 2021 came to a close, Jeff and Craig found something promising.

                          They saw a spike in the rate at which Facebook removed groups from the platform right before the election, a dramatic drop-off after the election and then another spike again around Jan. 6. The first spike in group removals seemed to show Facebook was capable of efficiently removing misinformation when it was determined to.

                          For example, reporters identified more than 300 QAnon groups in the CounterAction dataset. All had been removed by October 2020, when Facebook announced a total ban of QAnon.

                          But the speedy removals can be largely credited to a group task force within Facebook’s Civic Integrity Unit, which, according to former members, was disbanded soon after the election.

                          Facebook banned Stop the Steal groups on Nov. 5, 2020, but the rate of group removals appeared to drag after the election.

                          As rioters stormed the Capitol, Facebook was again taking down groups at a rate not seen since before the election.

                          With this in mind, the reporters narrowed their focus to the period between Election Day and Jan. 6, and made a point to look at Stop the Steal groups specifically, since they had a clear connection to the Jan. 6 attack.

                          Slowly but surely, the investigation was beginning to take shape.

                          Why Facebook Groups?

                          Misinformation on Facebook isn’t limited to groups. But the reporters had reason to believe they were a promising starting point.

                          For one thing, groups have been important to Facebook’s growth for a long time. The company has heavily promoted groups ever since Mark Zuckerberg made them his strategic priority in 2017. Jeff even remembers seeing ads for them on the New York City subway.

                          But they’re also one of the platform’s most toxic products.

                          Because of Facebook’s quest for engagement, Jeff explained, “many of the most popular groups are either clickbait content groups or political groups. And what’s politically engaging? It’s borderline bannable behavior.” In a March internal Facebook report, first published by Politico, Facebook identified “harmful” and “violating” narratives — content worth banning — as the “Worst of the Worst Hate,” “Violence & Incitement,” and “Vaccine Misinformation.”

                          “Facebook itself did a study saying when you set limits on what users should be allowed to see on the platform, the dynamics of the platform are such that people will walk right up to that line and try not to cross it,” Jeff said. The closer people can walk that line of prohibited content, like stoking political anger with misinformation, the farther their posts travel.

                          Many of the 650,000 group posts reporters identified as challenging the legitimacy of Biden’s election fell into this category. Facebook’s own report warned that these harmful narratives may have had “substantial negative impacts including contributing materially to the capital riot and potentially reducing collective civic engagement and social cohesion in the years to come.”

                          Drew Pusateri, a spokesperson for Meta, Facebook’s newly renamed parent company, declined to comment on specific posts for our January story, but said the company does not have a policy forbidding posts or comments that attack the legitimacy of the election. He said Meta has a dedicated groups integrity team and an ongoing initiative to protect people who use groups from harm.

                          Whittling It Down

                          To zoom in on the political groups with harmful content, reporters had to get a more accurate number of groups within the CounterAction dataset that were actually political. Floating around amid, for example, QAnon and Biden voter groups, were groups of knitters or runners or other groups unrelated to politics that might have ended up being monitored by CounterAction because one member shared a political link during election season.

                          Tools like keyword searches, which freed reporters from reviewing each group by hand, still cast too wide a net. For example, a search for all the groups that included posts with the word “Trump” would still catch a lot of online chatter in groups that aren’t political. They needed a way to calculate the scale of the problem that didn’t require them to read through all 100,000 groups.

                          Enter machine learning.

                          Jeff said when he is trying to figure out if a problem is suited for machine learning, he uses something he calls the “intern test.” “If a reasonably competent intern that you hired off the street who had no prior knowledge could be trained to do it fairly quickly — you show them a few examples like: this is inciting violence, this is not — then the machine learning algorithms could probably do it to a specific accuracy,” Jeff explained, as part of my ex-intern soul died a little out of sheer irrelevance.

                          Sorting groups into political and non-political buckets passed the intern test.

                          But in order to teach the machine how to do it, the team first had to do their own grunt work to provide the examples.

                          Many of the groups in the dataset disappeared from public view during this project. Based on the groups’ content and the time they disappeared, reporters believed many were taken down by Facebook. More than 5,000 groups that contained meaningful activity (meaning more than 10 of their posts had been flagged by CounterAction) that the reporters analyzed were no longer online as of August 30, 2021. They hand-labeled the political ones: If a group’s name and description showed that it had been created to represent or discuss U.S. politics, or a social movement with strong ties to politics, it went in the “political” bucket. Ultimately, the reporters found about 2,500 of these groups, including those for the QAnon conspiracy theory, militia groups and the Stop the Steal movement.

                          These groups essentially became the machine’s study guide.

                          The machine (a text classification model in this case) combed through the remaining groups and compared their posts to those from the 2,500 political groups Jeff had already shown it. Then it predicted how likely each new group was to be political. If the model said there was more than a 50% chance a group was political, the group went into the “political group” bucket. The model identified over 27,000 likely political groups from posts between Election Day and Jan. 6.

                          Then, like any good teacher, the reporters checked the machine’s work.

                          They went through a sample of the groups themselves, and determined the model had a precision rate of about 79%, meaning a little over 1 in 5 of the groups that the machine identified turned out to be false positives.

                          A C+: Under different circumstances, that wouldn’t be anything to display on the refrigerator door.

                          But the reporters were perfectly happy with it. They didn’t need A+ work, just an estimate accurate enough to cut down the size of the dataset they were working with.

                          Finding Insurrection Posts in a Haystack

                          The reporters then enlisted some more help, this time a text-analysis technique called TF-IDF.

                          Basically, if you give it a bunch of text, TF-IDF will pull out all the words that are used the most often, with more weight given to the most unusual ones.

                          “Words like ‘the,’ or ‘a’ or ‘and — they don’t really tell you anything about the content of a post, so those would get massively downweighted,” Jeff said.

                          Reporters sorted for all the Facebook groups with “Stop the Steal” in their names, since these were groups they could be sure sought to delegitimize Biden’s victory.

                          Then they fed this collection of Stop the Steal groups into TF-IDF, at which point it scratched its head and asked, “Which words make a group a Stop the Steal group?”

                          It pulled a list of important identifying words or phrases, like “mail-in ballot fraud,” “stop the steal,” “every legal vote” and “treason.” Reporters picked through everything TF-IDF brought up and
                          pulled out the terms that were meaningfully linked to election delegitimization theories; they found about 60.

                          They also found 86 terms that were linked to delegitimization theories, but only when they appeared alongside other terms. For example, “absentee ballots” on its own doesn’t suggest a post is toxic, but “absentee ballots” plus “fraud” does.

                          From there, the team did a keyword search based on the terms TF-IDF had identified, and came back with around 1.03 million posts that likely referenced delegitimization.

                          They again checked the program’s work by hand, going through a sample of the posts the keyword tool had surfaced and checking if they were actually related to election misinformation. The model had a precision rate of about 64%. (False positives included mainstream news articles about extremism, debunkings of fraud claims and references to other countries’ elections.)

                          To determine a rough number of delegitimizing posts, reporters multiplied the number of “likely” harmful posts (1.03 million) by the estimated proportion of actually toxic posts (64%).

                          Which brought them to their final estimate: more than 650,000 posts attacking the legitimacy of the 2020 election.

                          That number is almost certainly an undercount. As mentioned, this analysis only examined posts in a portion of all public groups, and did not include comments, posts in private groups or posts on individuals’ profiles.

                          Only Facebook has access to all the data to calculate the true total — and it hasn’t done so publicly.

                          Related

                          Tags: FacebookInsurrectionJan 6ProPublicaTrumpWashington DC
                          Previous Post

                          When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                          Next Post

                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          ProPublica

                          ProPublica

                          Related Posts

                          The Death of Privacy In America
                          Opinion

                          The Death of Privacy In America

                          May 4, 2022
                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair
                          Politics

                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          May 3, 2022
                          When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”
                          Business

                          When Billionaires Don’t Pay Taxes, People “Lose Faith in Democracy”

                          March 1, 2022
                          Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear
                          Education

                          Book Banning Is Only The Tip Of The Spear

                          February 23, 2022
                          A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards
                          Education

                          A Push to Remove LGBTQ Books in One County Could Signal Rising Partisanship on School Boards

                          February 23, 2022
                          End Of An Era
                          Politics

                          End Of An Era

                          November 4, 2021
                          Next Post
                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          Meta

                          • Register
                          • Log in
                          • Entries feed
                          • Comments feed
                          • WordPress.org
                          • Trending
                          • Comments
                          • Latest
                          You Are Not Welcome Here

                          You Are Not Welcome Here

                          August 13, 2020
                          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                          Social Distancing Fails At Ocean City High School

                          September 9, 2020
                          Trump, Chauncey Gardiner, And America’s Accidental Presidency

                          Trump, Chauncey Gardiner, And America’s Accidental Presidency

                          January 29, 2020
                          Open Letter To South Jersey Committee Chairs

                          Open Letter To South Jersey Committee Chairs

                          1
                          The Left’s Purity Dilemma, or Don’t Get Fooled Again

                          The Left’s Purity Dilemma, or Don’t Get Fooled Again

                          1
                          Let the Voters Decide

                          Let the Voters Decide

                          1
                          The Death of Privacy In America

                          The Death of Privacy In America

                          May 4, 2022
                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          America Sits At The Nexus of Fear, Rage, and Despair

                          May 3, 2022
                          Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                          Who Was Responsible For Fake News?

                          March 9, 2022

                          ©2019 Hopping Frog Studios, LLC.

                          No Result
                          View All Result
                          • Home
                          • Politics
                          • Justice
                          • Environment
                          • Health
                          • Education
                          • Housing
                          • Business
                          • Culture
                          • Sports
                          • National
                          • Opinion
                          • Login
                          • Sign Up

                          ©2019 Hopping Frog Studios, LLC.

                          Welcome Back!

                          Sign In with Facebook
                          OR

                          Login to your account below

                          Forgotten Password? Sign Up

                          Create New Account!

                          Fill the forms below to register

                          All fields are required. Log In

                          Retrieve your password

                          Please enter your username or email address to reset your password.

                          Log In
                          This website uses cookies to improve your experience. We'll assume you're ok with this, but you can opt-out if you wish.Accept Read More
                          Privacy & Cookies Policy

                          Privacy Overview

                          This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
                          Necessary
                          Always Enabled
                          Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
                          Non-necessary
                          Any cookies that may not be particularly necessary for the website to function and is used specifically to collect user personal data via analytics, ads, other embedded contents are termed as non-necessary cookies. It is mandatory to procure user consent prior to running these cookies on your website.
                          SAVE & ACCEPT