back to article Facebook can't admit the truth, says data-slurp boffin Kogan

The egghead behind the mass slurp of Facebook users’ information has said the social network is in “PR crisis mode” – as Cambridge Analytica enacted a crisis management of its own. During a British Parliamentary hearing on Tuesday, Aleksandr Kogan was grilled on his work with Facebook user data - which began as a research …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Let's be realistic. They might have had a marginal effect, but Trump got elected because there is a large sector of US society that is pretty stupid.

    Don't mention Brexit.

    These folks have been sordid and all that. But it is oversold.

    A few Ukranian girls and you can swing an election, perhaps. Facebook friends? Doubt it.

    But, Cambridge Anal. is likely getting unduly good advertising if we really believe Brexit and Trump populism was down to them. It's down to people being dumb and hearing what they want to hear, whoever says it.

    Far from people leaving the company we should now invest since after all this false advertising of their capabilities they will be unduly in demand....

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Facebook may well have gotten Trump elected but it was because everyone's racist uncle finally found out they weren't alone as opposed to any bot or foreign influence.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Whatever your views about Trump or Brexit, I'd have hoped that by now we'd have got beyond voters for either being dismissed as "stupid" or "dumb". There was real anger out there in major parts of our society that resulted in those votes going the way they did, and IMO we need to need to be seriously addressing the reasons why and what can be done to bring our societies together. Demonising one side or the other really doesn't help in that regard.

      1. Schultz

        "there was real anger out there..."

        Indeed, and a good part of real anger was foment es by fake news. The brilliant strategy of C.A. et al. was to figure out how to serve personalized 'news' that were tailored to fit a person's existing misconceptions.

        1. TVU Silver badge

          Re: "there was real anger out there..."

          "Indeed, and a good part of real anger was foment es by fake news. The brilliant strategy of C.A. et al. was to figure out how to serve personalized 'news' that were tailored to fit a person's existing misconceptions"

          And the same thing applied in the UK's 2016 Brexit referendum when it was Cambridge Analytica's sister firm in the SCL group, AggregateIQ, that did that same kind of work that secured the marginal win for the Leave campaign.

          1. Bernard M. Orwell
            Black Helicopters

            Re: "there was real anger out there..."

            "And the same thing applied in the UK's 2016 Brexit referendum when it was Cambridge Analytica's sister firm in the SCL group, AggregateIQ, that did that same kind of work that secured the marginal win for the Leave campaign."

            Here's a thought: We might consider CA to be the final balancing factor in the Brexit vote, yes, but it can be argued that surely one company can't have had the clout to be that final factor.... ...But what if CA isn't alone? What if the PtB used more than one company/method to rig/sway/influence the vote and we've only found ONE conspirator so far? If I were seeking to "influence the outcome" of such a pivotal and crucial vote I'd certainly not trust the result to a single actor.

            1. Peter2 Silver badge

              Re: "there was real anger out there..."

              the marginal win for the Leave campaign.

              The margin was about the number of people that voted for the SNP, DUP & Sinn Fein combined at the last general election, or the size of the 5th largest UK city if you'd prefer to put it that way.

              The problem simply is that people felt were ignored by mainstream politicans and there concerns and views of the mainsteam population were openly riddiculed with a divisive strategy (as so far as one could call it that) of fear and hate combined with "your either with us or against us".

              This only works if you have a majority and are willing to keep it by playing dīvide et imperā. However, it polarises and leaves the mildly no other option than full opposition, which has been well known for about the last two thousand years.

              As it turned out, "remain" was in a minority and by failing to win over anybody from "leave" they lost. The supposedly intelligent and educated people then (having discovered that they were a minority by losing FFS!) then continued with the same strategy which is only driving away their own supporters now according to all of the polling data. Complete lunacy brought to you by complete lunatics.

              Here's a thought: We might consider CA to be the final balancing factor in the Brexit vote, yes, but it can be argued that surely one company can't have had the clout to be that final factor.... ...But what if CA isn't alone? What if the PtB used more than one company/method to rig/sway/influence the vote and we've only found ONE conspirator so far?

              Here's a thought. You don't need conspiracy theroes. The "remain" electoral strategy was, and remains indefensibly crap. The weather (remember it rained?) made far more of a difference than facebook adverts did, as the people who voted out were (according to the remain campaign) in the demeographic who think a computer is a person who does math with a slide rule instead of an electronic device that can access the internet.

          2. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: "there was real anger out there..."

            And the same thing applied in the UK's 2016 Brexit referendum when it was Cambridge Analytica's sister firm in the SCL

            Yes, so many of us Brits are so stupid as to believe what we read in the Gruniad, Caily Fail etc and not form our own opinion.

            As an earlier poster said "they cannot form an argument as to why they lost so blame it on stupidity of the opposition"

            50.1% is still the majority, doesnt matter how slim or what the turnout was, if so many were worried about wether leave / remain wins they'd have got off their state funded Uni arses and voted.

            Almost as hypocritical as the anarchists who collect their state dole money

        2. tom dial Silver badge

          Re: "there was real anger out there..."

          Those eligible to vote are not stupid, but there is little reason to doubt that they are largely ignorant about public policy and generally deficient in the various related knowledge areas. Ilya Somin discusses this at length along with its basis and consequences in "Democracy and Political Ignorance."

          We ought, however, to be quite skeptical about CA's expansive claims of influencing election outcomes by analyzing Facebook scrapings and delivering tailored political ads and using Facebook are things about which we should be quite skeptical. They are likely to be much more marketing hype than fact. Kogan stated as much, and I have seen elsewhere that a Republican National Committee spokesman said the voter information from the states was more useful and heavily used than CA's. For my money, CA's brilliant strategy was that it persuaded Robert Mercer, who is far from stupid, to pour money into their coffers.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        If a turkey voted for Christmas, then it's either stupid or dumb or both.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Calling someone stupid or dumb that doesn't share your opinion is not going to make them agree with you or even question whether their own opinion could be wrong though don't let that stop you throwing cheap shots.

          1. Charles 9

            But it rallies others who share your opinion, at which point who cares about the other guy? That is literally what this is about: US vs. Them, Black and White, and to Hell with middle grounds and shades of grey.

          2. LucreLout

            Calling someone stupid or dumb that doesn't share your opinion is not going to make them agree with you

            I usually just interpret it as being the poster admitting they're too slow to think through their own position or that they have done so, found it wanting, and have resorted to playground tactics to deflect from the paucity of their position.

            Its very convenient for people to think of Brexit or Trump as being somehow stupid, or racist, because it saves them having to consider how the situation really came about, which has a lot more to do with people being overlooked, ignored, insulted, or shouted down.

            All of which is not helping their case - Trump remains in power, Brexit remains on course, and their own ideology is burning all around them. The world is walking away from the core beliefs of Clinton supporters & Remainers, and it is because they're too preachy to listen. But no, don't worry, those other people are stupid, dumb, and slow. FFS.

        2. Michael Habel

          If a turkey voted for Christmas, then it's either stupid or dumb or both.

          Then it would have voted for Clinton, and by proxy Remain.

        3. Charles 9

          "If a turkey voted for Christmas, then it's either stupid or dumb or both."

          OR voting against Thanksgiving and the pig.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            The problem is that a lot of dumb people were also advocating for Clinton and Remain and doing it badly.

      3. anonymous boring coward Silver badge

        "I'd have hoped that by now we'd have got beyond voters for either being dismissed as "stupid" or "dumb""

        So, just ill informed, uninterested, and lazy, then?

      4. Potemkine! Silver badge

        Demonising one side or the other really doesn't help in that regard.

        Refusing reality doesn't help either. Idiots are taking over, that's a fact.

    3. ForthIsNotDead

      @AC

      "Let's be realistic. They might have had a marginal effect, but Trump got elected because there is a large sector of US society that is pretty stupid."

      Changed to:

      Let's be realistic. They might have had a marginal effect, but Trump got elected because there is a large sector of US society that is pretty pissed off with establishment politicians.

      You're welcome.

    4. TVU Silver badge

      "Let's be realistic. They might have had a marginal effect, but Trump got elected because there is a large sector of US society that is pretty stupid"

      To the contrary, the presence of Facebook, Google and Cambridge Analytica teams embedded within the Trump campaign and the use of all that data to precisely target voters was essential to the Trump campaign in getting marginal wins across a number of states that wins the electoral college and the presidency (but not the popular vote).

      The only other major factor in that election was former FBI chief James Comey going public to state that Clinton was under investigation again over her emails. That dented her lead and she never recovered from that disclosure not even when Comey subsequently cleared her just a few days before election day but the damage was already done. The irony there is that Comey was instrumental in putting Trump in the White House and the rest is history.

      The really interesting thing is how that race would have gone if it had just been Trump + Analytica data vs. Cinton without the Comey intervention for it would have been much closer and even more interesting.

      1. tom dial Silver badge

        The Comey "October surprise" probably had little effect on actual voting. The claim that it does rests on the assumption that when he advised the Congress on October 28 of examination of Clinton email messages on Huma Abedin's personal laptop it caused an immediate and significant swing against her, but that the November 6 followup announcement failed to have the opposite effect. In fact, results from reelection polling completed before October 28 already were shifting modestly in favor of Trump, although weakly enough that several days later the Clinton campaign (publicly, at least) worried only about the presumptive victory not being a landslide.

        The real cause of Clinton loss may be encapsulated in the New York Times article

        https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/07/us/politics/bill-clinton-campaign.html

        which describes the campaign's failure to exploit Bill Clinton's demonstrated skills and knowledge, based on their analysis of the models they, the Obama campaigns, and the Democratic party had developed over the previous two election cycles.

    5. JohnFen

      Let's not forget that Trump lost the popular vote. Not by enough to matter, but the American people as a whole did not elect him.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Is there a country where the popular vote matters? I mean, in the UK you can win 30% of the popular vote and still win an outright majority in parliament.

        If you need an example of why to debate with people who disagree with you then look at what happenned when York Mosque confronted the EDL with offers of tea, biscuits and chat. All but two of the EDL protestors proved to be reasonable people and were probably turned away from extremism by being treated reasonably. The other two were left all alone.

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Facebook / CA little facebooks / Google etc are all basically Con-Artists!

    https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-04-24/make-facebook-and-google-information-fiduciaries

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Facebook can't admit the truth

    To admit it, would mean Zuk would have to acknowledge Shadow-Profiles, dodgy Data-Brokers, and sneaky Server-Side data-sharing with partners such as Airlines & Hotel sites etc. Zuk would also have to recognize that his ego is the size of a planet. He could retire in splendor and limit the criticism which also hits home at his family / kids too. However, he wants to influence and control the world - nothing less! Zuk desires a Facebook + Palantir + Cambridge-Analytica: * Person-Of-Interest * AI-machine - 'Data is Destiny':

    https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2018-palantir-peter-thiel/

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Person-Of-Interest * AI-machine

      Facebook/Palintir just see us all as marks to be manipulated. While all the time chanting -nothing-to-see-here- / Community / Connecting-the-World lies. These are orgs run by Sick dystopian-loving fucks! They're a bit like Cult leaders talking about healing and enlightenment to 'Zuck' you in, while all the time being arch manipulators / abusers etc. All they need to do now is combine Face-Palantir-Book and use the same or similar methods to groups such as NXIVM to enslave everyone:

      http://digg.com/2018/palantir-cambridge-analytica

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Facebook can't admit the truth

      Zuck himself said

      "The Dumb Fucks".

      That says it all really. It shows the contempt the likes of FB, Google etc have for us little people.

      CA helped Trump get elected by preying on the 40% of the US Electorate who are in IQ terms, 'the dumb fucks'.

      I don't believe a word that Zuck and the other top w*****s of US Tech corporations say anymore. Their only mission in life is to screw us into the ground.

  4. Nate Amsden

    el reg sure has it out for facebook

    Kind of funny to see. Now do the same for amazon and google! go get 'em!

    1. diodesign (Written by Reg staff) Silver badge

      Re: el reg sure has it out for facebook

      "Now do the same for amazon and google! go get 'em!"

      Great bait, mate. We've skewered Google and Amazon many, many times.

      C.

      1. TVU Silver badge

        Re: el reg sure has it out for facebook

        "Great bait, mate. We've skewered Google and Amazon many, many times"

        You are most welcome to add Cambridge Analytica and AggregateIQ to that skewer list too!

    2. Daniel Garcia 2
      Gimp

      Re: el reg sure has it out for facebook

      El Reg bites EVERY SINGLE HAND that feeds IT, twice if they deserve it.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    "I was just the unlucky person that ended up somehow linked to the Trump campaign"

    No truer words have ever been spoken.

    If the CA/Facebook slurpfest hadn't been tied to Trump in some way none of this would be in the news whatsoever.

    1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

      Re: "none of this would be in the news whatsoever."

      The problem was that they couldn't stop themselves from boasting about it. (see original C4 documantary about Silicon Valley, part 2 at the end).

      If they had kept quiet then the media interest would have been zero.

      1. Felonmarmer

        Re: "none of this would be in the news whatsoever."

        Well they were hired by Trump and Leave to do what they have been accused of doing. Leave probably broke spending limits by using them and Trump probably bent the rules on foreign participation in US elections by doing so. They claimed to have got a 7% shift in undecided voters and boasted that their work swung the election and have been selling there wares around the world to dodgy politicians on the back of the boasting.

        Now they say it's worthless.

        Even if it didn't work the way they claimed, they still tried to do it, it's like bank robbers claiming they are innocent because the vault was empty.

        1. Missing Semicolon Silver badge
          Meh

          Re: "none of this would be in the news whatsoever."

          .. while we conveniently ignore the state support for the "Remain" side.

          I suspect that the Leave campaigners realised that rules would need to be bent somewhat to counter the heavy Whitehall (and BBC!) bias.

          1. anonymous boring coward Silver badge

            Re: "none of this would be in the news whatsoever."

            BBC is in the Leave camp. Not because BBC staff in general are Leavers, but because the top brass is.

    2. P. Lee

      Re: "I was just the unlucky person that ended up somehow linked to the Trump campaign"

      >If the CA/Facebook slurpfest hadn't been tied to Trump in some way none of this would be in the news whatsoever.

      Well, the slurping of FB data by the Obama campaign was news. It was just that the media liked Obama and therefore praised him for it and moved on.

      "Ex-Obama Campaign Official: Here's How We Were Able To Mine So Much Facebook Data"

      https://www.dailywire.com/news/28424/ex-obama-campaign-official-heres-how-we-were-able-james-barrett

  6. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    WTF?

    "“The company management are more than happy to deal with, and support, the ICO,” "

    This is why he gets paid the big bucks.

    You've got to have some pretty big ones to just flat out lie to peoples faces who actually know the facts

    Clearly he is a man in possession of such tackle.

    1. Pascal Monett Silver badge

      Re: "“The company management are more than happy to deal with, and support, the ICO,” "

      Indeed.

      This is rewriting history in action.

  7. Winkypop Silver badge

    You supply the (personal) data for free

    We let you access a network while we sell the info on to whoever can pay.

    Your privacy is very important to us *

    .

    .

    .

    .

    * We don't want any other company to get it (without paying)

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    The data was useless so it's no biggie?

    "You really shouldn't fine me. I realise I was doing 90 in a 50-zone, but I ended up having to stop at a red light, and not saving any time, so it's no problem."

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Cambridge Anal.

    My mental editor took a red pencil to the term, filing it under El Reg peurility. But, on reflection, there's so much turd-polishing, arse -covering, and sphincter-tightening in this dogpile that, yes, it fits.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Cambridge Anal.

      Tell your mental editor it's : puerility

      ;-)

  10. SVV

    Remind us again of that phrase about no such thing as bad publicity?

    As Hunter S Thompson once wrote, Richard Nixon took solace in this phrase, but forgot that it only applies to showbusiness.

    1. Pascal Monett Silver badge

      Yes, but everything is showbusiness these days.

      1. Claptrap314 Silver badge

        Everything's been show business for quite some time. It's just that it's become more apparent.

  11. WJM1948

    Shucks, Dude, I'm Not That Smart

    Aleksandr Kogan’s Parliamentary testimony is designed to appeal to the anti-science bias among the crowd that most benefitted from his malfeasance.

    “I couldn’t be that smart or effective, I’m just an ivory tower elitist,” he said, adding “Science isn’t really that trustworthy.”

    1. WJM1948

      Re: Shucks, Dude, I'm Not That Smart

      And Tone at the Top doesn't exist, either. Fake News.

    2. anonymous boring coward Silver badge

      Re: Shucks, Dude, I'm Not That Smart

      Besides, it doesn't matter if Kogan is smart or not. He clearly is nowhere near as smart as CA and Wylie. He extracted the data -that's all he did of any consequence. Script kiddies can extract data -doesn't make them all that smart.

  12. IGnatius T Foobar

    Facebook insists on dictating the truth.

    Facebook is not in the business of admitting the truth. Facebook is in the business of creating its own version of the truth through propaganda, through manipulating people, through crafting its "algorithm" to make people think the way Facebook wants them to think.

    Facebook is toxic. Facebook is a cancer on the Internet and should be treated like one.

    "The Internet interprets censorship as damage, and routes around it." --John Gilmore, 1993 [http://uncensored.citadel.org]

  13. I8972490570816923859078493056703497430967093434677347864785234986359235

    People are like goldfish

    they will forget...

  14. Potemkine! Silver badge
    Thumb Up

    Brilliant!

    "Cambridge Anal."

    Well spotted!

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