No, Mitt Romney Didn't Personally Hack Your Facebook
from the going-mobile dept
And the election season silliness continues. In keeping with the tradition of campaigning against candidates' gaming habits and strange Obama/YouTube conspiracy theories, there's apparently been some hubbub surrounding the mysterious liking of Mitt Romney. Apparently a fair number of liberal-minded folks have noticed that their Facebook profiles have "liked" Mitt Romney on the social media network against the wishes of the profile owner. When questions began to rise as to how this was possible, one popular theory circulating was that Mitt Romney was Zero-Cool-ing people's Facebook profiles to garner more positive attention. Theoretically someone inside his campaign did this for him.
"Now we'll have to spell your name all 'puter like, p4uL rY4n!"
Image source: CC BY 2.0
Well, in what I'm sure will shock everyone, no, Mitt Romney and his campaign did not rappel into a server farm Mission Impossible style and hack the internet tubes. Instead, the culprit appears to be Facebook's clumsy mobile application and its accomplice Senor Your-Fat-Fingers.
[Facebook] concluded that users are probably liking the Romney page on a mobile device by either accidentally clicking on a Romney ad or a “sponsored story” from the Romney campaign in their news feed. A Facebook spokesman, who wanted to remain anonymous, said the issue is unique to mobile because of the way the app works on small screens, and rejected the idea that the Romney camp was engaging in clickjacking. He added that the company is currently working to clean up its mobile interface.That, coupled with people who are "liking" Romney's page just so they can see what he's putting out there, even though they may not support him, is admittedly a far less fun explanation than the idea of Romney going all The Net on social media, but I never claimed that the truth was better than fiction. So it's back to your regularly scheduled social media political talk for all of you. Remember: anyone supporting Obama is a Chinese commie spy moron and anyone supporting Romney is almost certainly Hitler.
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Filed Under: hacks, likes, mitt romney
Companies: facebook
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I've got my polarized sunglasses on, no worries :D
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People get plenty of reasons why they should not vote for the competition but very few on why they should vote for them. I hate negative politics.
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Fat-Fingers-Freddy explanation fails to factor...
I'm not too sure how much longer I'll have a Facebook account though. Between this type of thing, inability to sort my feed by time posted, and the constant sponsored stories I'm finding the site less and less valuable to actually get the information about people I care about.
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Re: Fat-Fingers-Freddy explanation fails to factor...
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Re: Fat-Fingers-Freddy explanation fails to factor...
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Re: Re: Fat-Fingers-Freddy explanation fails to factor...
As for the election, you'll have to get back to Diebold on that.
Myself, I'm casting a vote of "no confidence" in the system by staying home election night. I do not consent to be governed by this broken one party system, and I choose to deny its validity by not participating in its rituals. We have no democracy or representation in the United States of America.
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ID-Ten-T Error
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Gary Johnson for president!
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And we could get a great cabinet and Agency appointments out of the other writers on TechDirt.
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1. Initiate long-held plan to assassinate Mike Masnick, leading to my ascending to President
2. Ensure all government badges/emblems had "Motherfucking Eagle" plastered on them
3. Make the TSA where clown outfits. I mean, if they're going to go around creeping people out anyway....
4. Rescind the enforcement of copyright/patent law to a hilarious 3 days and watch the scrambling fun
5. Have my cabinet littered with high-priced call girls. At briefings around the table, my head is the only one you'll be able to see.
Is that REALLY what you want in a President?!!?!?
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Can you also refuse to sign anything, ever, just to make things harder for them?
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Well, when you compare it to the presidents we've actually had, then sure, why not?
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And rumors #1 (not that I'm a JFK conspiracy nut)....
I'm fully behind 2-4.
So, I don't really see a problem here DH.
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like a previous commenter posted: we are reduced to voting for the korporate shill we hate the least; at least with the masnick/dh ticket we'll have some fun before daddy takes the t-bird away...
art guerrilla
aka ann archy
eof
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Dibs on Secretary of Education.
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So let me get this straight....
Lets tack that on as yet another reason to not use facebook.
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Re: So let me get this straight....
I haven't seen any ads in the Internet in years.
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-rooted user with no FB account.
*trolldance*
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How times have changed. 25 years ago, that would have said Russian.
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I look at the picture and think...
Bend over Mr. Ryan its time for your prostate exam....
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While fat fingers might be the cause of the action, it sounds like Facebook's mobile interface is to blame. Why would clicking on an ad or a sponsored story cause you to "like" something? Since when does attention equal affection?
It sounds like Facebook is making a weird assumption in their user experience design that assumes that people only read about things they like.
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Similarly, I often use another app on her phone and accidentally click advertisements (bringing up the web browser with the advertisement). There's no real incentive for them to improve it, since that's how they get money.
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Funny as hell
http://youtu.be/2E87gciwebw
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Isn't it more likely
Gizmodo - Facebook Is Reading Your Messages and Liking Things For You
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Facebook's automatic like system is now even distorting the picture of political allegiances online: that's the story here, not debunking some ridiculous Mitt-sion Impossible scenario.
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1.Death to all Software Patents
2.Mandatory Life Sentence to all Patent Trolls
3.No Teaching of Fake Creation BS in Public Schools
4.Next A-Hole to make Rape Comments will be Raped by a broom handle
5.Real Effort to make and mass produce Alternative Non-Middle Eastern Petroleum
6.Work on Climate Issues
7.Teach Evolution in all Public Schools
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I would make a rape comment just to have that 'punishment' inflicted on me :)
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Not Allowed to Comment Unless You 'Like' Something
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what a steaming pile
E-V-E-R-Y-T-H-I-N-G I post is leaning left. Some of it is so far left, it scares some of my "progressive" friends.
So don't pee on my head and tell me it's raining. I have even attempted to block Bishop Willard's ads, and they still keep coming up. I have used every reason that they have. Do not tell me that it's my fat fingers either.
And wtf is zero-cool-ing?
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Re: what a steaming pile
First, shame on you for not knowing this. Second, here you go:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hackers_(film)
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I thought that only worked for Country music songs. You know, you get your dog, pick-up truck and girlfriend back when you play them backwards.
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Bullet dodged.
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Ahh back when Jolie was really hot.
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The reason Facebook gave such a malarkey answer is probably because they don't want people to realize how silly and easily gamed the "like" buttons are.
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Oh, the irony!
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Um, no. Something fishy is really, really happening
What most people don't know is that Facebook tracks EVERYTHING a user does on its site. Users can see everything they've done recorded in Facebook's Activity Log. Curiously, those who've been unwittingly signed up for Romney's page cannot find any Like for his page listed in their Activity Logs, unlike the many hundreds of other Likes they may have made. It's my opinion that this can only be a hack from the inside (whether Facebook knows it or not).
Facebook's Mobile Mistake theory doesn't hold up, as I demonstrated on my blog. The network security guru Mother Jones consulted in the article, Bill Pennington, doesn't buy Facebook's explanation either. There is more to this than most people know.
Obviously I don't think Mitt Romney is doing this himself but it appears that someone is doing it on the campaign's behalf. There's just too much anecdotal evidence to be anything else.
I urge anyone who's seen this happen to sign up for the Hacked By Mitt Romney page (http://www.facebook.com/MittYouDidntBuildThat) for more updates. You can also read my research on my blog, www.markturner.net.
Cheers,
Mark Turner
Founder, Hacked by Mitt Romney Facebook page
www.markturner.net
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I don't think so
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https://www.facebook.com/pages/Berwar-amedi/354181707958290?ref=hl
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