Is Facebook a Criminal Enterprise?
Public policy group calls on Biden administration to throw the book at social media giant
Francis Haugen, former Facebook employee turned whistleblower, has revitalized criticism of Mark Zuckerberg’s social media giant as a de facto monopoly that knowingly does social harm. As I noted in an earlier post, many of Haugen’s revelations come from the internal Facebook reports (dubbed the Facebook Files by the Wall Street Journal) and are damning, particularly Facebook’s foreknowledge that their algorithms served to ratchet up political extremism and drive some teenager to depression. Based on Haugen’s evidence, there is now a push not just in the United States but all over the world to reform Facebook, either by breaking up the company or regulating it.
But as damaging as the Facebook Files are, they only hint at a much deeper critique that can be made of company. The Facebook Files documents how the social media leviathan has been socially harmful and dishonest. But on October 29, the the American Economic Liberties Project (AELP) sent an open letter to the Biden administration alleging that Facebook has actually been engaged in crimes.
The letter called on the administration and the Securities and Exchange Commission to launch investigations into Facebook based on “five clear examples of apparent criminal activity.” These are: inflation of video metrics, inflation of advertising reach, securities fraud, lying to congress, and insider trading.
Some of the evidence for these allegations are from the Facebook Files but much more comes from existing court cases and earlier whistleblowers. The letter repeatedly documents cases of Facebook officers engaged in shady behaviour that certainly merits legal investigation. One example is how the company boasted to advertisers in the United States of the teenagers they were reaching. The only problem was the claimed Facebook reach was a number greater than the total number of American teens.
The AELP letter provoked David Dayen to write a powerful column for The American Prospect that argued we should confront “the growing set of allegations that [Facebook is] a transnational criminal enterprise that will continue to break the law unless its leadership is held accountable.”
Dayen concludes:
And yet there is importance in recognizing what Facebook’s harms to society are all about. This is an enterprise that has capitalized on the lack of a rule of law to consolidate power, reap illegal profits, and engage in personal enrichment for its executives. Misinformation in the News Feed is a distraction. Criminal misconduct is the real issue, and only by putting that front and center can real pressure be created to force the Justice Department to live up to its name.
This goes a little too far in dismissing the problem of misinformation. I think spreading misinformation and fomenting extremism for the sake of clicks are subjects that Facebook can legitimately be subject to government investigation. But Dayen is absolutely right that the main problem is alleged criminal activity. This offers a pathway for a more stinging and frontal attack on the company that goes beyond anti-trust law and regulation.
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Facebook is a criminal organization and the owner must be put in prison and fined a billion dollars. Fuck Mark Z