Facebook's head of security Alex Stamos 'leaving over fake news'
Facebook chief information security officer Alex Stamos is leaving the company in August in a row over how the company should deal with fake news, sources say.
Stamos had repeatedly clashed with top executives, including chief operating officer Sheryl Sandberg, on how much information should be shared about Russia's manipulation of the social media giant to spread fake news and meddle in the 2016 election.
Stamos was a strong advocate for revealing the full extent of the Russian influence, and to restructure to address some of the issues, while other top execs were keen to keep that information private, sources told the New York Times.
Frustrated, he reportedly announced he was planning to resign in December, at which time Facebook moved him to a new role and removed his responsibilities to counter government-sponsored disinformation.
Facebook chief information security officer Alex Stamos (pictured in July) is leaving the company in August in a row over how the company should deal with fake news
Stamos confirmed in a tweet today he was still currently employed by Facebook, although did not deny plans to leave in the summer, and said that his role at the company has changed.
'I'm currently spending more time exploring emerging security risks and working on election security,' he tweeted.
Stamos, who joined Facebook from Yahoo in June 2015, will be the first high ranking exec to depart Facebook since the company was accused of allowing fake news to be spread across its social network.
He was persuaded to stay through August to oversee the transition of his duties because company executives thought his exit would look bad, it said, citing current and former employees.
His departure reveals an internal struggle in Facebook.
Facebook removed Stamos' responsibilities to counter government-sponsored disinformation in December after he told them he was planning to leave, the source said
Reportedly, many believed it would have been better to keep quiet on Russia.
There was a particular clash between Stamos' security team, and the legal and policy teams who prioritized the business above user's privacy.
'The people whose job is to protect the user always are fighting an uphill battle against the people whose job is to make money for the company,' Sandy Parakilas, who worked at Facebook enforcing privacy until 2012 , told the Times.
Stamos conceded on Monday that he's had 'some disagreements with all of my colleagues' as they faced some 'challenging issues.'
Two days ago Stamos tweeted: 'There are a lot of big problems that the big tech companies need to be better at fixing.
'We have collectively been too optimistic about what we build and our impact on the world. Believe it or not, a lot of the people at these companies, from the interns to the CEOs, agree.
It comes as Facebook faces fresh scrutiny amid media reports that political consultancy firm Cambridge Analytica, which worked on President Donald Trump's election campaign, harvested private information from more than 50 million Facebook users.
Members of Congress called on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify about Facebook's actions on Monday in the wake of the revelation
Facebook was already struggling to address how much to share Russia's alleged use of Facebook to sway spread divisive and false news posts before and after the 2016 election.
Facebook could not be immediately reached for comment.
Members of Congress called on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify about Facebook's actions on Monday in the wake of the revelation.
Meanwhile, British privacy regulators are seeking a warrant to search the offices of the U.K.-based Cambridge Analytica as both US and European lawmakers demand an explanation of how the consulting firm gained access to the data.
Facebook said on Monday it had hired forensic auditors from the firm Stroz Friedberg to investigate and determine whether Cambridge Analytical still had the data.
'Auditors from Strop Fried berg were on site at Cambridge Analytic's London office this evening,' the company said in a statement late Monday. 'At the request of the UK Information Commissioner´s Office, which has announced it is pursuing a warrant to conduct its own on-site investigation, the Strop Fried berg auditors stood down.'
Facebook shares closed down nearly 7.0 percent on Monday, wiping nearly $40 billion off its market value as investors worried that new legislation could damage the company's advertising business.
'The lid is being opened on the black box of Facebook data practices, and the picture is not pretty,' said Frank Passable, a University of Maryland law professor who has written about Silicon Valley's use of data.
Cambridge Analytica, a communications firm based in London, was hired by the team behind Donald Trump's successful US presidential bid.
An affiliate of British firm Strategic Communication Laboratories (SCL), Cambridge Analytica has offices in London, New York, Washington, as well as Brazil and Malaysia.
The company boasts it can 'find your voters and move them to action' through data-driven campaigns and a team that includes data scientists and behavioural psychologists.
'Within the United States alone, we have played a pivotal role in winning presidential races as well as congressional and state elections,' with data on more than 230 million American voters, Cambridge Analytica claims on its website.
This information obtained by Cambridge Analytica is said to have been used to help elect President Donald Trump in the US, as well as to boost the Brexit campaign in the UK. CEO Alexander Nix (pictured) has said the firm was 'always acquiring more' data
Speaking to TechCrunch in 2017, CEO Alexander Nix said the firm was 'always acquiring more' data.
'Every day we have teams looking for new data sets,' he told the site.
The firm said it strongly denied the media claims, and that it deleted all Facebook data it obtained from a third-party application in 2014 after learning the information did not adhere to data protection rules.
However, further allegations about the firm's tactics were reported late Monday by British broadcaster Channel 4 which said it secretly taped interviews with senior Cambridge Analytical executives in which they boasted of their ability to sway elections in countries around the world with digital manipulation and traditional political trickery.
Cambridge Analytical rejected the allegations, saying in a statement that the Channel 4 report 'is edited and scripted to grossly misrepresent the nature of those conversations and how the company conducts its business.'
Facebook was already facing calls on Saturday for regulation from the U.S. Congress after the reports in the New York Times and London's Observer over the weekend.
Republican Senator John Kennedy called on Zuckerberg to testify before Congress, and Democratic Senator Ron Widen sent a letter to Zuckerberg asking about company policies for sharing user data with third parties.
HOW MANY AMERICANS SAW RUSSIA'S DIVISIVE ADS DURING THE 2016 US PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION? Facebook says ads that ran on the company's social media platform and have been linked to a Russian internet agency were seen by an estimated 10 million people before and after the 2016 US presidential election. The company turned 3,000 ads over to three congressional committees in October 2017 as part of their investigations into Russian influence in the 2016 election. In a company blog post, Facebook's Elliot Schrage said the ads appeared to focus on divisive social and political messages, including LGBT issues, immigration and gun rights. In many cases, the ads encouraged people to follow pages on those issues. Facebook said last month that the ads appear to have come from accounts associated with a Russian entity called the Internet Research Agency. Fewer than half of the ads - which ran between 2015 and 2017 - were seen before the election, with 56 percent of them seen after the election.
Facebook usually sends lawyers to testify to Congress, or allows trade organizations to represent it and other technology companies in front of lawmakers.
Facebook and other social media companies including Twitter Inc and Alphabet Inc's YouTube have taken voluntary steps to restrict possible foreign interference and combat false news, but they have not been forced by law or regulation to make changes and legislation on the issue has stalled.
Late on Monday, the Connecticut Attorney General said the office will initiate an inquiry into Facebook data policies.
The Senate was expected to move forward on Monday with a bill that would chip away at the internet industry´s legal shield, a decades-old law known as Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, with a bill intended to address online sex trafficking.
The measure has already passed the House and is expected to soon become law. Facebook said on Friday it had learned in 2015 that a Cambridge University psychology professor lied to the company and violated its policies by passing data to Cambridge Analytical from a psychology testing application he had built.
Facebook said it suspended the firms and researchers involved and said the data had been misused but not stolen, because users gave permission.
'(Tech companies) are going to get a lot more scrutiny over what data they are collecting and how they are using it,' said Shawn Cruz, senior trading specialist at TAD Ameritrade in Chicago.
Earlier this year, Facebook admitted that the social media platform may be detrimental to democracy.
In a series of blog posts in January, Facebook execs said the site was 'far too slow' in identifying negative influences that rose with the 2016 US election, citing Russian interference, 'toxic discourse,' and the 'dangerous consequences' of fake news.
Facebook added that it was 'making up for lost time' in fighting forces that threaten to 'corrode' democracy.
The firm has rolled out some major changes to the News Feed, with plans to prioritize content from friends and family, and make posts from business, brands, and media less prominent – and, ensure the 'news people see, while less overall, is high quality.'
Zuckerberg himself said that he wanted 2018 to be one of 'self-improvement' for the social site, but stopped short of announcing clear policy plans.
'The world feels anxious and divided, and Facebook has a lot of work to do - whether it's protecting our community from abuse and hate, defending against interference by nation states, or making sure that time spent on Facebook is time well spent,' he said in a post in early Janaury.
'My personal challenge for 2018 is to focus on fixing these important issues. We won't prevent all mistakes or abuse, but we currently make too many errors enforcing our policies and preventing misuse of our tools.'