Coordinated Trolling Efforts Are Serving Up Small-Scale Election Interference Across The Country

from the I'm-so-old-I-remember-this-being-nothing-more-than-knocking-down-yard-signs dept

A brave new world of voter suppression is upon us. It isn't shadowy government guys with guns patrolling polling centers in search of "voter fraud" unicorns. It isn't the surrealistic landscapes created by gerrymandering. It isn't even the messages being sent from the top man in the land: that people who aren't Caucasian are probably bussed-in illegals voting straight Democrat.

This new voter suppression flows through the internet, originating in closed chat sessions and manifesting as disinformation campaigns meant to steer certain voters away from the polls.

In a private “strategy chat” with more than 40 far-right trolls, one user who tried to create a new Twitter account to spread disinformation ahead of Tuesday’s midterms elections described how he had hit an immediate roadblock: Twitter banned him for deliberately giving out the wrong election date.

“Were they really banning people for saying [vote on] November 7? Lol, whoops,” the user, whose name was a racist joke about Native Americans, wrote. “Maybe that’s what got me shadowbanned.”

As the report points out, some of Twitter's anti-election interference efforts appear to be working. Tweets containing the wrong voting date were blocked before they were seen by other users. But there's only so much algorithms can catch. Faced with this blocking, the trolls viewed in this chat room adjusted their tactics.

Several were successful in creating unique identities that appeared to be middle-aged women who posted anti-Trump rhetoric as part of a long-term effort to build up followings that could later be used to seed disinformation to hundreds or thousands of followers.

If this seems counterproductive in terms of eliminating votes for non-Republican candidates, it actually isn't. As NBC's Ben Collins notes, this more clever effort has managed to elude moderators. Posting under hashtags like #nomenmidterm and #letwomendecide, these accounts are being used to deter male liberals from casting votes.

The interference is coming from inside the house. Homegrown efforts are joining foreign state-sponsored interference to make every election from 2016's to the rest of forever seem tainted. This is piled on top of ongoing problems with electronic voting devices, which are notoriously insecure and far from user friendly. The democratic process appears to be no more secure than a connected tea kettle.

But this cascade of bad news shouldn't deter anyone from voting. For the most part, the system works! (And by "system," I mean the actual act of voting, not necessarily the system run by those receiving votes…) Even if the individual act of voting can often feel pointless or useless, it's still better than the predetermined "elections" held by despotic governments where the outcome is made-up and the points don't matter.

This also shows efforts to quell online disinformation are working to a limited extent. Combining humans and algorithms makes more sense than relying solely on one method, but both have their limitations. Human biases can strip the neutrality out of moderation efforts and algorithms tend to do one thing pretty well, but suck at anything else that requires comprehension of context, nuance, or sarcasm.

This is the new normal for elections. Get used to it. But don't get discouraged.

Filed Under: content moderation, election, election day, social media, trolling

New Report Details Massive Mysterious Influence Campaign On Twitter

from the something's-happening dept

Over the weekend, the group Guardians.ai released a fascinating report detailing what appears to be a massive influence campaign taking shape on Twitter. By way of disclosure, one of the three key authors of the report, Brett Horvath, is also one of the key people behind the election simulation game that we helped create and run, though I have nothing to do with this new report. The report is fascinating, and if you don't feel like reading the whole thing, Bloomberg also has a write up.

The key to the report is that they have identified some truly fascinating patterns that they've spotted among a cluster of users on Twitter, who, at the very least appear to be acting in a manner that suggests some attempt to influence others. I should note that unlike other such reports that jump to conclusions, the authors of this report are very, very, very clear that they're not saying these are "bots." Nor are they saying these are Russian trolls. Nor are they saying that a single source is controlling them. Nor are they saying that everyone engaged in the activity they spotted is officially part of whatever is happening. They note it is entirely possible that some very real people are a part of what's happening and might not even know it.

However, what they uncovered does appear strange and notable. It certainly looks like coordinated behavior, at least in part, and it appears to be designed to boost certain messages. The report specifically looks at statements on Twitter about voter fraud using the hashtag #voterfraud, but it appears that this "network" is targeting much more than that. What made the report's authors take notice is that in analyzing instances of the use of the tag #voterfraud, they noticed that it appeared to have a "heartbeat." That is, it would spike up and down on a semi-regular basis, based on nothing in particular. There wasn't a specific news hook why this entire network would suddenly talk about #voterfraud, and they wouldn't talk about it all the time. But... every month or so there would suddenly be a spike.

From there, they started digging into the accounts involved in this particular activity. And they found a very noticeable pattern:

We wanted to know how these accounts were coming onto Twitter and gaining mentions at such a high velocity — what was leading accounts to gain influence, so quickly? So we took a sample set of accounts from a group of suspicious Voter Fraud accounts and started looking at their activity day-by-day, starting at day one. What we began to notice is a pattern for how the influence machine might be working, and how coordination could be happening.

Here's the consistent network pattern we saw:

• User signs up for an account.
• User starts replying to multiple accounts—some known verified Twitter users and many other accounts that are also on our list of actors, or that fit a similar profile.
• The replies tend to contain: text, memes, hashtags, and @mentions of other accounts, building on common themes.
• At some point the pattern shifts from being all replies to original tweets. Those original tweets contain the same types of content as their replies do.
• It appears that this pattern cycles and repeats when the next batch of new accounts come online. The next batch starts replying to the existing, newly influential accounts, and carry on with the same sequence of events for gaining influence.

The report highlights this pattern with a few example accounts, though the full study looked at (and continues to look at) many, many more. What you see over and over again are Twitter feeds of people who seem to do little other than constantly tweet pro-Trump memes and disinformation, and yet magically get thousands and tens of thousands of retweets, often coming out of nowhere. Here's one example:

The gray line at the bottom is the number of tweets. The black line is the number of mentions from others. Notice how it goes from nothing to around 10,000 in no time? Sometimes the accounts are more or less dormant for a while, before suddenly becoming massively popular for no clear reason at all:

Again, as the report makes clear, these aren't necessarily bots (though, they may be). They aren't necessarily even aware that they're a part of something. But the patterns seen over and over and over and over again are uncanny. And it certainly provides strong circumstantial evidence of some sort of influence operation -- and it's one that appears to continue to grow and grow.

As the report notes:

We don’t know why this activity is occurring, or who is behind it. However, the best we can do is look at the data around what’s actually happening. What we've discovered along the way is that there are overlapping patterns of behavior, demonstrating some form of coordination.

We think it's possible that some of these accounts don't realize that they're coordinating or part of a larger influence network. For example, one of these sample accounts might genuinely care about Voter Fraud. A bad actor, coordinating large numbers of accounts could find this person’s tweets useful, then amplify those tweets through thousands of @mentions and replies.

By focusing on the hard data around coordination, we can better understand how public conservations are being distorted and how it affects society. Whatever your views are on Voter Fraud, these accounts and the accounts that amplify them are rapidly accelerating their activity in the lead-up to Election Day.

Similarly, of course, it's not clear that this is actually having any impact on anyone's views. But it's at least worth looking at what happens when there is what appears to be massively coordinated activity, mostly focused around spreading disinformation regarding the election and more. The full methodology of the report is available on the site, as are the names of 200 of the accounts studied.

What's fascinating, of course, is the sheer size of what's happening, and the level of coordination necessary to make it happen. Twitter's response to the report (as noted in the Bloomberg article) is pretty much what you'd expect Twitter to say:

“While we prohibit coordinated malicious behavior, and enforce accordingly, we’ve also seen real people who share the same views organize using Twitter,” the company’s statement said. “This report effectively captures what often happens when hot button issues gain attention and traction in active groups.”

Indeed, that's part of what's so tricky here. Could this kind of thing happen organically? Well, certainly much of it can. Lots of people who share the same views on any particular subject often will see surges in conversations around those topics, including lots of retweets, mentions and replies. But the pattern here definitely looks different. When these things happen organically, they tend to have a fairly different rhythm, either a lot more sustained, or the spikes are much more spread out and explainable (e.g., there was some news event that tied to the topic). Similarly, it is hard to see how so many pseudononymous people, who no one else really knows, magically all jump up to thousands or tens of thousands of mentions with no clear explanation for their sudden and sustained fame.

But this is also why Twitter is put in an impossible position if it's expected to spot all of this. Even with so much evidence, it's still possible that what Guardians.ai spotted was organically formed. It may seem unlikely, but how can you tell? And you can bet that there are some with less than virtuous intent, who are actively figuring out ways to increasingly make all of this activity look organic. Expecting that Twitter, or any company, can always magically determine what is and what is not "authentic" behavior online, is an impossible task. And the very fact that it might sweep up some perfectly innocuous accounts in the process also makes it troubling to expect that the platform should be in charge of sorting out who's who and who's real in these kinds of situations. But, then again, if these kinds of disinformation campaigns truly are having an impact on influencing the public, that too should be a concern. Either way, as the report highlights, there is still much work to be done in analyzing how social networks are being used to influence the public.

Filed Under: bots, campaigns, coordination, influence, politics, social media
Companies: twitter

Supreme Court To Hear Case That Could Possibly (But Not Really) Impact Social Media Content Moderation

from the not-going-to-happen dept

This week, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the appeal in a case called Manhattan Community Access Corp. v. Halleck, which some are arguing could have a major impact on whether or not social media sites are barred from moderating content because they're quasi state actors and the 1st Amendment blocks them from moderating content.

Let's be clear on this: while something could go completely wacky and sideways (it is 2018, after all) the chances of this ruling directly impacting social media platforms is very, very, very, very, very, very, very small. That does not mean whatever ruling won't be cited by various plaintiffs to make bizarre arguments -- as we've seen repeatedly with people misinterpreting the Packingham decision. However, given both the facts of this case, and the way the Supreme Court works, I would be shocked if this ruling has any significant impact at all.

This case involves a public access channel, Manhattan Neighborhood Network, where two producers -- DeeDee Halleck and Jesus Melendez -- were apparently fired for making critical comments about the network. They sued, claiming their First Amendment rights were violated, because the city and the network -- as a state actor -- were punishing them based on the content of their speech. The city has been dismissed from the case as it has basically nothing to do with any of this. The question at issue is whether or not this public access channel is a "traditional public forum," in which even a private operator can be judged to be a de facto representative of the government and subject to the limits on the state -- such as the First Amendments ban on suppression of speech.

While the lower court sided with the network, the 2nd Circuit reversed, deciding that this particular public access channel represented a public forum. MNN warns, in its petition for cert that if allowed to stand, this ruling could be used to go after social media sites as public forums.

Courts are routinely faced with the state actor conundrum in new contexts. For example, a New York district court recently had to rule on whether part of President Trump’s Twitter account is a constitutional public forum. See Knight First Amendment Inst. at Columbia Univ. v. Trump, No. 17-cv-5205, 2018 WL 2327290, at *5 (S.D.N.Y. May 23, 2018). There, the court held that a portion of the President’s Twitter account— but not Twitter itself—was a constitutional public forum because the government controlled the content of the tweets sent from the President’s account. Id. at *15. See also Davison v. Plowman, 247 F. Supp. 3d 767, 776 (E.D. Va. 2017) (holding that a municipal county’s Facebook page was a “limited public forum”).

Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram are all popular social media venues used for sharing political opinion. And, though they are all privately owned and operated, they are subject to numerous federal and state laws, exist because the government created the Internet, and are utilized by all levels of government. But applying the traditional state actor analysis should still lead to the conclusion that these entities and their employees are not state actors. See, e.g., Prager Univ. v. Google LLC, No. 17- cv-06064, 2018 WL 1471939, at *8 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 26, 2018) (dismissing First Amendment claims against YouTube and Google); Shulman v. Facebook.com, No. 17-cv-00764, 2017 WL 5129885, at *4 (D.N.J. Nov. 6, 2017) (Facebook not constitutional state actor). Under the new test announced by the Majority, it is not so clear that these entities are divorced from state action.

While I'm not against the Supreme Court clarifying that this is not accurate, it would be a pretty amazing stretch for courts to read the 2nd Circuit's ruling in a way that leads to this result. As we discussed in our post about the ruling in the Knight 1st Amendment Center's case against Donald Trump for blocking people on his Twitter feed, there's a big difference in a general "public forum" and a "designated public forum" which is limited to just a specific area that the government itself has created and has control over. Just as that case was limited very specifically to followers of Trump (as opposed to Twitter users in general), the 2nd Circuit's ruling in this case appears pretty clearly limited to the facts of this case, where the government made it clear that it wanted this public access channel to be a general public forum. A key issue here, as laid out in the brief of the fired producers is that the NY government specifically created this particular forum:

New York City created the public access channels: New York State obligates municipalities to compel the creation of public access channels, and New York City fulfilled that obligation in the requirements it has imposed on cable franchisees in New York.

That is, quite clearly, not true of internet social networks. Indeed, the lawyers for the fired producers argued that the network and its lawyers appear to be a bit confused about the difference between a general public forum and a limited designated public forum:

First, as we have already explained, petitioners are wrong to assert that the court of appeals established a per se rule that governs all public access stations. See pp. 13-20, supra. Petitioners’ analysis conflates the “traditional public forum” analysis (which often does establish bright-line rules) with the “designated public forum” doctrine (which does not). Because the decision below is specific to the particular “framework” (Pet. App. 13a) that governs New York City, it has no implications for localities that have made different choices.

Second, petitioners lose sight of the fundamental principle that only the government may designate a non-traditional place as a public forum. That is, for “a place not traditionally open to assembly and debate,” it is a “public forum” only if “a government intended to designate” it as such. Walker, 135 S. Ct. at 2250 (quotation and alteration omitted). See also Arkansas Educ. Television, 523 U.S. at 677 (“Designated public fora * * * are created by purposeful governmental action.”). A place cannot be designated a public forum absent intentional government action.

So, that really seems like it would limit the impact of any such ruling in this case to apply more broadly to the content moderation choices of internet platforms. I have no problem with the Supreme Court taking this case, and hope that they do clarify what counts as a state actor in public forums -- especially in limiting it to true state actors.

But I would be absolutely shocked if the Court really rules in any way in this case that will impact social media platforms, because it's such a stretch to read the lower court ruling that way. My guess is that -- as it often does -- the Supreme Court will seek to rule narrowly and won't even address the issues regarding private social media platforms. One hopes that they will be careful enough not to leave a few stray sentences and arguments that might be spun around by various people to argue it means that internet platforms cannot moderate content at all. But, given the way so many people have been trying to turn the Packingham ruling into something it is not (ditto for the Pruneyard case about malls as public forums -- which is a very limited ruling, but is regularly cited by people who don't understand it). So, it would be nice if the Supreme Court makes a clear ruling that prevents such abusive claims outright, but I'm guessing the ruling will be much more narrow and will have no clear impact on social media platforms, which basically everyone recognizes are not "state actors" and have every right to moderate their own platforms however they would like.

Filed Under: 1st amendment, content moderation, deedee halleck, jesus melendez, manhattan neighborhood network, public access, public forum, social media, supreme court
Companies: manhattan community access

'See Something Say Something' Sends Philly Counter-Terrorism Unit After A Local Journalist Over A Harmless Facebook Post

from the citizens-need-to-learn-the-power/responsibility-adage dept

It's troubling how little is needed to trigger a police investigation and some ancillary damage to the First Amendment. Thanks to flagging tools provided by social media platforms, almost anything can be sent to local law enforcement for additional inspection, which results in the following sort of thing, in equal parts absurd and horrifying.

It all started Dec. 14, when local DJ and gay activist Matt Beierschmitt took to Facebook to chastise gays for patronizing a nightclub named ICandy at 254 S. 12th St. Its owner had made headlines in 2016 when he was recorded making disparaging remarks about black people. [Philadelphia journalist Ernest] Owens responded, echoing his sentiments and blasting both ICandy and the Mummers.

"I say, 'F– em,' they will be shown better than told," Owens wrote. "I will just leave it at that. A great reckoning is coming."

Four days later, Owens said, he got a phone call from Detective Lawrence Richardson Jr. of the Police Department's Dignitary Protection and Counter Terrorism Operations unit, informing him that he was being investigated because of his Facebook comment.

"I said, 'What?'" he recalled. "I'm thinking: 'They're calling me about something on Facebook?' Police shouldn't be engaging me over a Facebook post."

But they were. Philly police insisted on speaking personally to Owens about his post. He met them at the unit's headquarters the next day. Once there, the officers said stuff about "see something, say something" and proceeded to question Owens about gun ownership, bomb-making ability, and any plans he might have to harm anyone else. After answering these questions, the police told Owen he was "cleared" and free to go. The officers also told him this was standard procedure police follow when criminal activity is reported.

Except there was no criminal activity. There was only a single Facebook post helpfully forwarded to the police by another Facebook user.

During the interrogation, Owens said, he noticed paperwork listing the name of the man who had complained about his Facebook comment.

That man, James DePre, a saxophone player and leader of the Quaker City String Band, said Wednesday that he emailed Owens' comment to the police after someone sent it to him and after he'd attended a parade-safety planning meeting of officers from the Third and Fourth Districts and community members, including Mummers.

"At that meeting, the police said, 'If you see something, say something.' I don't even know who he is," DePre said of Owens. "'A day of reckoning is coming,'" that was the thing I reacted to. That's what prompted me to send it to the police. If you have a public event and you get a message like that, that stood out to me. So I said, 'Here it is, you can do whatever you want with it.'"

Well, they did what they wanted to with it. This should be a cautionary lesson to social media users. If you send something to law enforcement, they may decide to take away someone's freedom. If something goes wrong during this process, they may also take away someone's life. "Better safe than sorry" is a shitty platitude to deploy after some "see something, say something" do-gooding ends a fellow citizen's life. I don't expect social media users to be experts in sussing out true threats, but they should definitely be more careful about dragging men with guns into the mix over ambiguous words posted during heated discussions.

This doesn't necessarily mean the police are out of line. This is what we pay law enforcement to do: follow up on reported criminal activity. But everything about law enforcement is discretionary, which can result in rights violations or biased response rates. "See something, say something" very rarely results in actionable info, but police are just as invested in the "better safe than sorry" platitude and do what they can to encourage this unfortunate cycle of events.

There's no good fix for this. All that can be offered is an abundance of caution. People making complaints need to recognize the potential severity of a law enforcement response. And law enforcement needs to realize it doesn't need to disrupt a citizen's life just because some internet rando sent them a Facebook screenshot. All in all, this could have gone worse. But even when it goes well, it still has an adverse effect on people who committed no crime but still find themselves surrounded by cops demanding to know about the weapons they own (gun ownership: still legal) and their level of antipathy towards their fellow humans. Non-custodial interviews are bullshit because they often require proving negatives to law enforcement satisfaction while requiring almost nothing from the law enforcement officers asking the questions.

Ernest Owens has made more of this than is strictly necessary, but he's not completely wrong. He may be overstating the effect of this interaction with law enforcement, but he certainly will feel less free to post his thoughts in public forums, especially if those thoughts are critical of others.

Filed Under: ernest owens, free speech, philadelphia police, police, see something say something, social media
Companies: facebook

The Good Censor Document Shows Google Struggling With The Challenges Of Content Moderation

from the thoughtful-analysis dept

Last week, the extreme Trump-supporting media sites went positively ballistic when Breitbart released a leaked internal presentation entitled "The Good Censor." According to Breitbart and the other Trumpkin media, this is somehow "proof" that Google is censoring conservatives, giving up on free speech and planning to silence people like themselves. To put this into a context those sites would understand, this is "fake news." I finally had the time to read through the 85 page presentation and, uh, it paints a wholly different picture than the one that Breitbart and such sites have been painting.

Instead, it pretty clearly lays out why content moderation is impossible to do well at scale and that it will always result in decisions that upset a lot of people (no matter what they do). It also discusses how "bad actors" have effectively weaponized open platforms to silence people.

It does not, as some sites have suggested, show a Google eager to censor anyone. Indeed, the report repeatedly highlights the difficult choices it faces, and repeatedly highlights how any move towards increased censorship can and will be abused by governments to stamp out dissent. It also is pretty self critical, highlighting how the tech companies themselves have mismanaged all of this to make things worse (here's just one example of a much more thorough analysis in the document):

The presentation actually spends quite a lot of time talking about the problems of any censorship regime, but also noting that various governments basically are requiring censorship around the globe. It's also quite obviously not recommending a particular path, but explaining why companies have gotten more aggressive in moderating content of late (and, no, it's not because "Trump won"). It notes how bad behavior has driven away users, how governments have been increasingly using regulatory and other attacks against tech companies, and how advertisers were being pressured to drop platforms for allowing bad behavior.

The final five slides are also absolutely worth reading. It notes that "The answer is not to 'find the right amount of censorship' and stick to it..." because that would never work. It acknowledges that there are no right answers, and then sets up nine principles -- in four categories -- which make an awful lot of sense.

Be more consistent

• Don't take sides
• Police tone instead of content

Be more transparent

• Justify global positions
• Enforce standards and policies clearly
• Explain the technology

Be more responsive

• Improve communications
• Take problems seriously

Be more empowering

• Positive guidelines
• Better signposts

You can quibble about these, but they're mostly good general principles (though perhaps hard to put into practice). I also think there are some other ideas that are missing -- such as moving control out to the ends of the network, rather than continuing to handle everything at the company level or providing incentives for good behavior -- but this is hardly the list of a company saying it's actively going to censor political speech. Indeed, many of the complaints from people about the moderation is the lack of transparency and consistency in these actions. Though, I'd also argue that this presentation underplays why consistency is so difficult when you rely on thousands of people to make determinations on content with varying shades of gray and no clear answers as to what's "good" or "bad."

So while this document is being used to attack Google, it actually is yet another useful tool in showing (1) just how impossible it is to do these things right and (2) how carefully companies are thinking about this issue (rather than just ignoring it, as many insist). I recognize that's not as "fun" a story as slagging the big bad tech giant for its plan to silence people, but... it's a more accurate story.

Filed Under: content moderation, free speech, government pressure, market of ideas, social media, the good censor
Companies: google

Federal Court Dumps Another Lawsuit Against Twitter For Contributing To Worldwide Terrorism

from the legal-definition-of-insanity dept

The lawsuits against social media companies brought by victims of terrorist attacks continue to pile up. So far, though, no one has racked up a win. Certain law firms (1-800-LAW-FIRM and Excolo Law) appear to be making a decent living filing lawsuits they'll never have a chance of winning, but it's not doing much for victims and their families.

The lawsuits attempt to route around Section 230 immunity by positing the existence of terrorists on social media platform is exactly the same thing as providing material support for terrorism. But this argument doesn't provide better legal footing. No matter what approach is taken, it's still plaintiffs seeking to hold social media companies directly responsible for violent acts committed by others.

Eric Goldman has written about another losing effort involving one of the major players in the Twitter terrorism lawsuit field, Excolo Law. Once again, the plaintiffs don't present any winning arguments. The California federal court doesn't even have to address Section 230 immunity to toss the case. The Anti-Terrorism Act allegations are bad enough to warrant dismissal.

Here's what the court has to say about the direct liability arguments:

The FAC [First Amended Complaint] plausibly alleges that ISIS used Twitter to reach new followers, raise funds, and incite violence. It also adequately alleges that Twitter knew ISIS-affiliated users were posting these communications, and that it made only minimal efforts to control them.

Nevertheless, the direct relationship link is missing. Most of the allegations are about ISIS's use of Twitter in general. The relatively few allegations involving Twitter that are specific to the attacks that killed plaintiffs' family members also provide little more than generic statements that some of alleged perpetrators of the attacks were "active" Twitter users who used the platform to follow "ISIS-affiliated Twitter accounts" and otherwise "communicate with others." Nothing in the FAC rises to the level of plausibly alleging that plaintiffs were injured "by reason of" Twitter's conduct. Consequently, the direct ATA claims are dismissed.

The indirect liability route doesn't fare any better:

The FAC does not allege that Twitter was "aware" that it was "assuming a role in" the terrorists' attacks in Europe. See id. It does not allege that Twitter encouraged ISIS to carry out these attacks or even knew about them before they occurred. At most, the FAC alleges that Twitter should have known ISIS was planning an attack and that it ignored the possible consequences of letting terrorists operate on its platform. That is in effect an allegation of recklessness, but JASTA [Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act] requires more. Although plaintiffs are correct that Congress referred in its statement of findings and purpose to those who "knowingly or recklessly contribute material support or resources" to terrorists, JASTA § 2(a)(6) (emphasis added), the plain language of Section 2333 reaches only those "knowingly providing substantial assistance." 18 U.S.C. § 2333(d)(2). This clear statutory text controls.

There's no plausible conspiracy claim either. If this argument was given credence by the court, Twitter would be a co-conspirator in any criminal activity carried out by its users.

Nothing in the FAC establishes an agreement, express or otherwise, between Twitter and ISIS to commit terrorist attacks. Plaintiffs point to Twitter's terms of service that every user is subject to, but while that clearly is an "agreement," it is hardly relevant to a terrorist conspiracy. No other plausible agreement is mentioned in the FAC.

The plaintiffs are given one more chance to amend their complaint, but these are allegations that can't be massaged into victorious arguments. The problem that continues to be talked around in these lawsuits is that you cannot hold a social media platform responsible for the actions of its users. If the plaintiffs drop the ATA arguments, they're just going to run into Section 230 immunity. While the acts of terrorism were horrific and drastically affected the lives of the families of those killed, suing Twitter, Facebook, et al over these acts doesn't do anything for the plaintiffs but take time and money away from those who've already lost loved ones.

I'm not suggesting the law firms engaging in these lawsuits are lying to plaintiffs about their chances or encouraging futile litigation. I certainly would hope they aren't engaged in any of the above because that would mean they're preying on hurting people to earn income. But this steady stream of lawsuits -- much of it emanating from two law firms -- seems to suggest a level of intellectual dishonesty that's especially unseemly given the underlying circumstances.

Filed Under: blame, cda 230, intermediary liability, lawsuits, material support, social media, terrorism
Companies: excolo law, twitter

African Countries Shooting Themselves In The Digital Foot By Imposing Taxes And Levies On Internet Use

from the how-not-to-do-it dept

Techdirt has written a number of stories recently about unfortunate developments taking place in the African digital world. The Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI ) site has usefully pulled together what's been happening across the continent -- and it doesn't look good:

A4AI's recent mobile broadband pricing update shows that Africans face the highest cost to connect to the internet -- just 1GB of mobile data costs the average user in Africa nearly 9% of their monthly income, while their counterparts in the Asia-Pacific region pay one-fifth of that price (around 1.5% of monthly income). Despite this already high cost to connect, we're seeing a worrying trend of governments across Africa imposing a variety of taxes on some of the most popular internet applications and services.

The article goes on to list the following examples.

Uganda

imposes a daily fee of UGX 200 ($0.05) to access social media sites and many common Internet-based messaging and voice applications, as well as a tax on mobile money transactions.

Zambia

has announced it will levy a 30 ngwee ($0.03) daily tax on social network use.

Tanzania

requires bloggers to pay a government license fee roughly equivalent to the average annual income for the country.

Kenya

aims to impose additional taxation on the Internet, with proposed levies on telecommunications and on mobile money transfers.

Benin

imposed a 5 CFCA ($0.01) per megabyte fee to access social media sites, messaging, and Voice-over-IP applications, causing a 250% increase in the price for 1GB of mobile data.

The article explains that the last of these was rescinded within days because of public pressure, while Kenya's tax is currently on hold thanks to a court order. Nonetheless, there is a clear tendency among some African governments to see the Internet as a handy new source of tax income. That's clearly a very short-sighted move. At a time when the digital world in Africa is advancing rapidly, with innovation hubs and startups appearing all over the continent, making it more expensive and thus harder for ordinary people to access the Internet threatens to throttle this growth. Whatever the short-term benefits from the moves listed above, countries imposing taxes and levies of whatever kind risk cutting their citizens off from the exciting digital future being forged elsewhere in Africa. As the A4AI post rightly says:

Africa, with the largest digital divide of any geographic region, has the greatest untapped potential with regards to improving affordable access and meaningful use of the internet. With affordable internet access, African economies can grow sustainably and inclusively.

Sadly, in certain African countries, that seems unlikely to happen.

Follow me @glynmoody on Twitter or identi.ca, and +glynmoody on Google+

Filed Under: africa, benin, censorship, fees, internet, internet access, kenya, levies, social media, tanzania, taxes, uganda, zambia

State Attorneys General Really Want To Go After Big Internet Companies; But Claim It's About Privacy, Not Bias

from the we'll-see... dept

We've written a few times about how Attorney General Jeff Sessions' plan to meet with State Attorneys General about going after big internet companies for perceived political bias was a clear First Amendment problem. He still held the meeting earlier this week, and it appears that at least some of the attendees agreed that targeting how the platforms present content was likely a non-starter, even if Sessions apparently kept trying to raise it as an issue. From a Washington Post report that quotes a few people who were in attendance:

Attorney General Jeff Sessions opened the meeting by raising questions of possible ideological bias among the tech companies and sought to bring the conversation back to that topic at least twice more, according to D.C. Attorney General Karl A. Racine.

Of course, the fact that the others in attendance mostly pushed past the question of political bias isn't exactly good news for the internet platforms, as the AGs apparently focused on other ways they could and should target the companies:

“We were unanimous. Our focus is going to be on antitrust and privacy. That’s where our laws are,” Jim Hood, Mississippi’s attorney general, said in an interview.

Of course, it seems like almost journalistic malpractice to quote Jim Hood talking about going after social media platforms without mentioning the fact that he was the centerpiece of a the conspiracy by the top movie studios to attack Google with nonsensical complaints about illegal things he found while doing searches on Google. If you don't recall, the Sony hack revealed a plot by the legacy movie studios to have their lawyers effectively run an investigation for Jim Hood -- and even the NY Times revealed that his eventual subpoena to Google was written by the MPAA's lawyers. A judge reviewing Google's legal fight with Hood noted that it seemed pretty clear that Hood's actions were done in "bad faith." So... consider me at least marginally skeptical that Hood is an objective voice on what is and is not appropriate for a state Attorney General to investigate regarding the big internet platforms.

Obviously, if there are real antitrust violations, then that's a valid issue to explore. But, so many of the attacks themselves seem to be a hell of a lot more "politically biased" than any of the claims about how the internet companies themselves are politically biased.

And while there was some talk about the privacy practices of the various platforms (which, while they may be concerning, it's not clear how any of them violate any laws...), some of the talk also involved an astounding incomprehension of the encryption discussion. And, for that, we'll go back to Jim Hood again:

For other states, the issue was the tech industry’s relationship with law enforcement. That included talk about Apple and “how we in law enforcement depend on cellphones.” Hood said that Apple has “waved at us and didn’t use all their fingers” in its handling of encryption.

That is not at all an accurate portrayal of what happened. Apple was making sure that everyone's information was safe by using strong encryption. The FBI sought to undermine that safety by demanding that Apple make a massive, and very dangerous, change to its software.

Indeed, it's quite incredible for Hood to bring this up in the context of the AGs discussing "privacy" concerns about how the big tech companies handle data. If you want them to protect data, you want them to use strong encryption. Yet, here, Hood is whining that Apple dared to actually protect people's privacy.

So... if tech companies actually protect people's privacy with strong encryption, they get yelled at and threatened with legal action by Attorneys General. And if they don't protect people's privacy... they get yelled at and threatened with legal action by Attorneys General. Just what exactly are they supposed to do?

Again, it is entirely possible that these companies have violated various laws. Perhaps they're in violation of antitrust laws, though the evidence there is lacking so far. But, from everything that's been said coming out of this meeting, it does not inspire much confidence that there are reasonable and objective reasons for taking legal actions against these platforms. Instead -- and this is all too typical for state AGs -- there appears to be a lot of grandstanding and bluster without much substance.

Filed Under: antitrust, encryption, first amendment, free speech, internet, jeff sessions, jim hood, privacy, social media
Companies: apple, facebook, google

White House Admits Exec Order To Regulate Social Media Is 'Real,' But No Idea Who Wrote It, And Won't Use It

from the well,-there's-that dept

On September 14th, we wrote about a draft executive order basically tasking the executive branch with "investigating" the major internet companies for evidence of "bias" that might lead to antitrust activity. As we wrote at the time, the draft executive order was poorly drafted, didn't make much sense, and was almost certainly unconstitutional. It took a week, but the rest of the tech policy world finally discovered the same draft executive order this past Friday (amusingly with some insisting that they had the "scoop" a week after we wrote about it).

Now, the White House has admitted that the document is "real", though they're not entirely sure who crafted it, it hasn't gone through any of the normal processes, and there's no intention of moving forward with it. In other words, it sounds like a pet project of someone in the White House to have in a drawer in case it was needed at some future date. From the Washington Post:

But three White House aides soon insisted they didn’t write the draft order, didn’t know where it came from and generally found it to be unworkable policy. One senior White House official confirmed the document had been floating around the White House but had not gone through the formal process, which is controlled by the staff secretary.

Asked about the document, Lindsay Walters, the deputy White House press secretary, said of the digital-age ‘whodunit’ on Saturday: “Although the White House is concerned about the conduct of online platforms and their impact on society, this document is not the result of an official White House policymaking process.”

There is some speculation in the article that the document actually originated from Yelp, which has spent the past decade or so trying to get any government anywhere to bring the antitrust hammer down on Google. If that turns out to be true, it speaks very poorly of Yelp, as a company trying to leverage an obviously bullshit claim of "search bias" to try to achieve its unrelated goals. It would also almost certainly backfire on Yelp in a big way, as the biggest tool that the government has to try to "punish" Google would be to modify Section 230 of the CDA -- which, arguably, Yelp relies on much more than Google does.

It's good that this document is clearly going nowhere, though it still is worth noting that at least someone in the White House thought it was worth passing around for discussion as they try to determine "what to do" about the made up problem of "bias" in search.

Filed Under: administration, executive order, political bias, social media, white house
Companies: google, yelp