WAPO: Facebook says it sold political ads to Russian company during 2016 election

This is a significant development.




Facebook says it sold political ads to Russian company during 2016 election

Representatives of Facebook told congressional investigators Wednesday that it has discovered it sold ads during the U.S. presidential election to a shadowy Russian company seeking to target voters, according to several people familiar with the company’s findings.

Facebook officials reported that they traced the ad sales, totaling $100,000, to a Russian “troll farm” with a history of pushing pro-Kremlin propaganda, these people said.

A small portion of the ads, which began in the summer of 2015, directly named Republican nominee Donald Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton, the people said. Most of the ads focused on pumping politically divisive issues such as gun rights and immigration fears, as well as gay rights and racial discrimination.

The acknowledgment by Facebook comes as congressional investigators and special counsel Robert Mueller are probing Russian interference in the U.S. election, including allegations that the Kremlin may have coordinated with the Trump campaign.

The U.S. intelligence community concluded in January that Russia had interfered in the U.S. election to help elect Trump, including by using paid social media trolls to spread fake news intended to influence public opinion.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...s-410pm:homepage/story&utm_term=.dc8002e1c5c8

the consensus by_every_intelligence organization from_every_western country is that the Russian government began actively assisting trump in the primaries.

knowing that, it takes all the logic of a six year old to realize that DJT was therefore the worst choice of all the candidates. Trump was probably endorsed by ISIS in addition to neo-Nazis and white supremacists.

i mean seriously think know about how simple this is. russia wants DJT to be president of the USA ergo, he's the last person we should want as president of the USA.

why did they do it

WakeandBake said:

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How is this significant

dmcheatw said:

i mean seriously think know about how simple this is. russia wants DJT to be president of the USA ergo, he's the last person we should want as president of the USA.

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Why? I think getting along with Russia would be a good thing. They have 8,000 nuclear weapons.

i think getting along with russia is a good thing too, but i don't think we should let them meddle in our elections as they are the basis for our government. If a foreign country can manipulate the basis of our political system, then they are by extension heavily influencing our ideas, values, and ways of life. Basically all elements of a society develop from political stability and when the most basic element of your political organization is open to foreign manipulation it dramatically weakens that political system.

Lets get along with everybody but retain our autonomy. If underhanded shit is going to be used (and it will be), it should be left to the masters of manipulation--u.s.

The manipulation started in the primaries.

So the theory is that Russia wanted to delegitimize whomever became president, create distrust in the electoral process, and sow discord and anarchy.

Mission accomplished.

Does anyone know Nedic personally. Could he/she be a Russian Bot?

Seems he really began a posting flurry just when Bobstack4life disappeared. Curious.

WAPO: Facebook says it sold political ads to Russian company during 2016 elec...

Yes. And Russia wanted to install a leader with Russian business interests like they did in other countries. That's why they helped Trump.

Clearly the Dem's fault for acknowledging and over-condemning Russian meddling, thus sewing the doubt the Russians were looking for. Pub hands are clean, Dims just walked straight into the trap. If they just would have ignored it, none of this would have mattered. Consequences are more to blame than the initial action in today's world.

marquee moon said:

How is this significant

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just shows how the sheep learned to follow an idiot (Trump) and his verbal diarrhea.

knowell said:

So the theory is that Russia wanted to delegitimize whomever became president, create distrust in the electoral process, and sow discord and anarchy.

Mission accomplished.

Does anyone know Nedic personally. Could he/she be a Russian Bot?

Seems he really began a posting flurry just when Bobstack4life disappeared. Curious.

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just the thing a russian bot would say

ImTheCaptain said:

just the thing a russian bot would say

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knowell said:

So the theory is that Russia wanted to delegitimize whomever became president, create distrust in the electoral process, and sow discord and anarchy.

Mission accomplished.

Does anyone know Nedic personally. Could he/she be a Russian Bot?

Seems he really began a posting flurry just when Bobstack4life disappeared. Curious.

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Lol Jesus. As ITC said above this is exactly what a Russian bot would say. Except for the first paragraph that's spot on.

Sorry Knowell, no Russian bot. Just a proud yankee and wake grad who witnessed the Republican party's intellectual dishonesty up close and personal for years. The GOP turning a blind eye to Russian election interference was the last straw for me.

The tunnels is my place to vent and drop truth so I don't piss off family and friends. And for the record, I've been posting about Trumps relationship with Russia since summer 2016. Well before Bot Bob decided to drop fake news stories about one of my favorite DC pizza joints.

Facebook Enabled Advertisers to Reach ‘Jew Haters’

Until this week, when we asked Facebook about it, the world’s largest social network enabled advertisers to direct their pitches to the news feeds of almost 2,300 people who expressed interest in the topics of “Jew hater,” “How to burn jews,” or, “History of ‘why jews ruin the world.’”

To test if these ad categories were real, we paid $30 to target those groups with three “promoted posts” — in which a ProPublica article or post was displayed in their news feeds. Facebook approved all three ads within 15 minutes.

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knowell said:

So the theory is that Russia wanted to delegitimize whomever became president, create distrust in the electoral process, and sow discord and anarchy.

Mission accomplished.

Does anyone know Nedic personally. Could he/she be a Russian Bot?

Seems he really began a posting flurry just when Bobstack4life disappeared. Curious.

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I don't think that it's they wanted to delegitimize whoever became president - they just thought America being led by Donald was a benefit to them because he's a political neophyte plus they knew from past interactions with him how to manipulate him. I don't think they intended to be found out that they were tinkering with the electorate.

Wakeforest22890 said:

I don't think that it's they wanted to delegitimize whoever became president - they just thought America being led by Donald was a benefit to them because he's a political neophyte plus they knew from past interactions with him how to manipulate him. I don't think they intended to be found out that they were tinkering with the electorate.

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Could be, but the odds of Trump winning appeared to be very slim. They may well have preferred Trump, but you would think they were also game planning for the more likely scenario of Hillary winning. Betting on a likely loser and angering the winner seems like a very poor gamble.