The Senate's Finsta Problem

from the that's-now-how-it-works dept

Earlier this year we wrote about Senator Richard Blumenthal's viral "finsta" debacle in which he asked a Facebook executive to "end Finsta" as if (1) it was a product, or (2) it was "endable." Some people pushed back on the mocking of Blumenthal, noting that he (or at least his staffers) actually understood what "finsta" meant, since he had given an accurate description earlier, and his staff had set up a fake Instagram account, pretending to be a young girl to see what happened. However, as we and others noted, if he actually understood "finsta" that made his demand to "end Finsta" even worse, because it meant he was calling for an end to anonymity on Instagram, which would have huge problems -- especially for more marginalized people or those at risk, who have very good reasons for not using their real names on social media.

Of course, rather than learning from that debacle, Senators across the board seemed to see it as an opportunity to score some media headlines when they dragged in Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri to testify in yet another one of the Senate's pointless, grandstanding "big tech bad" hearings last week. Senator Blumenthal brought back his finsta. On the other side of the aisle, both Senators Marsha Blackburn and Mike Lee rolled out their own finstas. And all of them were shocked, shocked, shocked, to find that sometimes they didn't like what the algorithm recommended to them.

Except, as an article at the National Journal highlights, this little game of gotcha doesn't make much sense and is not how good research is actually done.

Joshua Tucker, a co-director of the NYU Center for Social Media and Politics, said Senate staff don’t have the time or training to make broad inferences about how teens experience Instagram.

“In a sense these [fake accounts] are useful, because they are surfacing things that can happen on the platform,” Tucker said. “But it’s this leap from ‘it can happen’ to ‘this is prevalent, this is common’—that’s when you need the more sophisticated research design.”

Tucker called it “ironic” that lawmakers are deploying these fake accounts in hearings, given ongoing concerns from Blumenthal and others that “finstas” are a menace and the fact that creating such accounts violates Instagram’s terms of service.

“These are exactly the types of protections that we are asking Congress to provide to researchers—to protect researchers who want to do research, who want to go about and find out how these platforms work, to protect them from being attacked by companies for violating terms of service,” Tucker said.

But, rather than handing access to actual researchers who can determine whether or not there's a problem -- and if there is a problem how big or how prevalent it is -- Senators are instead pushing out garbage science. That is, they're pushing anecdotal examples based on a single case set up in a way specifically designed to try to get the outcome they want.

Not surprisingly, when journalist Brendan Bordelon pointed all this out to Blumenthal's office, it was dismissed in Blumenthal's typically dismissive manner:

The Connecticut Democrat shrugged off the idea that there’s something ironic about his creation of a fake account, given his concerns about “finstas” generally.

“I think it’s justified to be illustrative and then disclosed, and nothing done with it,” Blumenthal said. “It’s not like we set it up to exist for any length of time. We set it up to see what happened, and then we shut it down.

“If I were analogizing it to law enforcement, it’s a little bit like having somebody work undercover,” he said.

It's a misleading anecdote, and for someone who claims to be so concerned about misinformation, you'd think that Blumenthal would be careful not to create more of it.

And... that's not even getting into the point that all of these Senators broke Instagram's terms of service, and according to some interpretations of the law, that means they violated the CFAA. It seems like it would be a hell of a lot more productive to fix that, rather than freaking out about the other stuff.

Hide this

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

Filed Under: anonymity, finsta, kids, marsha blackburn, mike lee, richard blumenthal, terms of service
Companies: instagram


Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread


  1. identicon
    Annonymouse, 15 Dec 2021 @ 10:20am

    It's not garbage science.
    It's garbage labled as science.
    There is a difference.

    It's like saying that the venn diagram for common sense and good sense is a circle when there isn't any actual overlap between the two.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  2. icon
    That One Guy (profile), 15 Dec 2021 @ 11:02am

    'Look at us Doing Something!'

    'How dare the CFAA-violating accounts we created specifically in order to get a certain result return those results?! Something Needs To Be Done!'

    link to this | view in thread ]

  3. identicon
    Glenn, 15 Dec 2021 @ 12:56pm

    The U.S. Senate... our biggest threat to Internet freedom (and freedom generally).

    link to this | view in thread ]

  4. icon
    Samuel Abram (profile), 15 Dec 2021 @ 1:00pm

    Re:

    Save one US Senator named Ron Wyden (D-OR)

    link to this | view in thread ]

  5. icon
    ECA (profile), 15 Dec 2021 @ 2:36pm

    the idea keeps coming back

    There are allot of reasons to be ANON.
    there are Few reasons that anon should not be allowed.
    But in the end its all freedom of speech. right, wrong, opinion, suggestion, what ever.

    Its amazing that When those in power Actually go out and see whats being Done, and said on the net, they are Shocked.
    As if, it has never happened in RL. Just cause you dont talk about something dont mean it Aint happening.
    I debated FB, about using true names, and didnt get anywhere. I dont even know where they got the idea that REAL names do anything good. Except to be able to track The person you want.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  6. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 15 Dec 2021 @ 4:42pm

    Headline: Senator Blumenthal wants to know the REAL NAMES of the young girls he's contacting on Instagram.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  7. identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 15 Dec 2021 @ 5:23pm

    Re:

    Tho they yet to pass any new bills as of yet.

    link to this | view in thread ]

  8. This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    icon
    sonneriesvip (profile), 15 Dec 2021 @ 7:21pm

    Re: the idea keeps coming back

    télécharger des sonneries de téléphone gratuites sur https://sonneriesvip.com/

    link to this | view in thread ]


Follow Techdirt
Essential Reading
Techdirt Deals
Report this ad  |  Hide Techdirt ads
Techdirt Insider Discord

The latest chatter on the Techdirt Insider Discord channel...

Loading...
Recent Stories

This site, like most other sites on the web, uses cookies. For more information, see our privacy policy. Got it
Close

Email This

This feature is only available to registered users. Register or sign in to use it.