MrRodgers
Posts: 10542
Joined: 7/30/2005 Status: offline
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quote:
ORIGINAL: Real0ne quote:
ORIGINAL: MrRodgers Can cyber technology undermine election laws ? Allegations that Russian propagandists used the platform (Facebook) to interfere with the presidential election were initially described by Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s boss, as a “pretty crazy idea”. But a string of revelations have put the company on the backfoot, most recently, that Russian companies, some with Kremlin ties, had purchased $150,000 worth of political adverts. The agency entrusted with protecting elections and policing campaign finance is the Federal Election Commission (FEC), known by some as the “failure to enforce commission." At the FEC: Four votes are needed to change anything, and the Republican commissioners are usually opposed to the very idea of campaign-finance regulation. Don McGahn, a former FEC commissioner who is now the White House counsel, has said “I plead guilty as charged” to “not enforcing the law as Congress passed it”. In 2006 commissioners were deadlocked on just 3% of substantive votes on enforcement cases; in 2016 that share rose to 30% of cases. “Do we want Vladimir Putin or drug cartels to be influencing American elections?” asked Ann Ravel, a former Democratic commissioner, at a meeting of the FEC back in October 2015. The commission voted to do nothing. Ms Ravel later resigned from her post in February, disgusted by its “dysfunction and deadlock." Facebook says it will self police but others may not. However, nobody can find out anything as the co. releases few details needed to do any evaluation. Even after Facebook has taken action against 30,000 fake accounts in France, it provides nothing to confirm that. Efforts to extract more information have proven fruitless: a spokesperson would not discuss the number of employees working on the effort (calling it a “personnel matter”) or when the project began. This has attracted the interest of Congress and of Robert Mueller, the special counsel investigating Russian interference. Yet Facebook, despite being accused of something so serious, will probably be allowed to police itself, for now. Will a subpoena be enforceable here ? A proper fix would need legislation. Senators Mark Warner and Amy Klobuchar are drumming up support for a future bill which would require disclosure of ad content, cost, targets and information on who paid. This seems sensible. Elections are rather important to democracy. They should be protected by more than benevolent self-regulation by Silicon Valley. HERE scawoosh! there goes the internet! democracy is delusion It was sometime before W95 and on a $2,200 PS2 (yes and even with a 15% IBM discount) I saw the future of the WWW soon reduced to a profit center, the beginning of the end of print journalism as we knew it and otherwise...ripe for bullshit. I have been proven basically correct. There was talk of an Web II reserved for science and academics. We'll see but I am not holding my breath.
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You can be a murderous tyrant and the world will remember you fondly but fuck one horse and you will be a horse fucker for all eternity. Catherine the Great Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite. J K Galbraith
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