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  Geebo 9:05 am on September 4, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Facebook, Small Business ( 4 )   

  Facebook is no friend to small businesses 

  

  If your Facebook feed is anything like mine it’s probably filled with friends and family either oversharing details of their life you have no interest in or it’s the same people arguing politics in a not so civil manner. This is by design as Back in February, Facebook announced it was retooling its news feed algorithm to bring you more content from your friends and family and less from businesses and brands. Those changes are now said to be hurting small businesses.

  NBC News is reporting that small businesses and content creators are seeing a substantial drop in their revenues thanks to Facebook’s change to bring people closer together. Just about every business or website needs a presence on Facebook since so many people use Facebook as their sole window to the rest of the world. However, this leaves those dependent on Facebook for getting their message out at the whims of an ever-changing landscape on the platform. Following small and local businesses on Facebook is not only a great way to get a good deal but could also lead to finding more local businesses that you might be interested in. Also, notice that Facebook is cutting down on posts from businesses and content creators showing up in your feed and not Facebook’s ads. I guess they want to connect more people as long as they’re still being targeted by Facebook’s own advertising, but I digress.

  Whenever I find a new business that I’m interested in patronizing, I wince a little when I find out that their only internet presence is a Facebook page. Again, you’re at the mercy of a third-party platform that could affect your business in a multitude of ways including deleting your Facebook page if somehow your business goes against Facebook’s arbitrary community guidelines. While you may think having a website is expensive, in the long run, it’s best for your business or content. There are also many inexpensive services that allow you to not only launch your own website but also design it very easily without having to hire an overpriced web designer.

  The bottom line is, if your business model depends on Facebook it may be in jeopardy as Facebook doesn’t depend on you.

   

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  Geebo 9:18 am on August 29, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Australia ( 3 ), Facebook, hate speech ( 14 )   

  Facebook hate speech continues to spread across the world 

  

  Previously, I’ve posted about how unfettered hate speech on Facebook has led from everything to ethnic cleansing, to lynch mobs and refugee persecution from Myanmar to Germany. Now imagine you open Facebook in your browser today and you read about how a group of ‘patriots’ wants to go all vigilante on an entire ethnicity just because a few people of that ethnicity have committed a crime. If you were in America you may think we’ve somehow traveled back in time to the Jim Crow-era South, but in Australia, that’s happening right now in the city of Melbourne, where many white citizens, politicians and some of the media are blaming on the Sudanese community.

  In America, we tend to have a very narrow view of the rest of the world as we tend to be a very insular country. This results in sometimes viewing countries like Myanmar as third-world countries and that they’re problems don’t affect us. However, we’re now talking about Australia. While they may be on the other side of the globe, they are one of the most prosperous countries in the world in both finance and freedoms. The ignorant hate speech in Australia calling for violence against the Sudanese is just a small example of what could happen here in the U.S. if we’re not careful.

  As The Guardian points out, Facebook has no real incentive to try to curb hate speech on its platform. If it were to do so, it would not only cut into the company’s growth but its profits as well. Just look at the situation in Myanmar for example, Facebook wouldn’t even lift a finger to curb hate speech against the Rohingya minority in Myanmar until the United Nations accused Myanmar’s leadership of allegedly committing genocide.

  If hate speech is to be curbed on Facebook it needs to be done by us, its users. The best way to do that would be to abandon the platform since it has become a haven for toxic behavior. If Facebook can’t control the power it’s unleashed on the world then we have to take back the power for ourselves by making Facebook a footnote in online history, much like Facebook did to MySpace.

   
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  Geebo 9:09 am on August 27, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: ethnic cleansing ( 8 ), Facebook, Myanmar ( 10 ), Rohingya ( 9 ), United Nations ( 2 )   

  Facebook removes pages of top Myanmar officials 

  

  I’ve been posting about the crisis in Myanmar for a while now. If you’re unfamiliar with the situation in the country formerly known as Burma, the majority Buddhist government has been accused of fueling hate crimes and ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya Muslim minority, forcing close to a million Rohingya to flee Myanmar into Bangladesh. One of the ways the Myanmar government is accused of persecuting the Rohingya is by spreading false information about the Rohingya through Facebook. Facebook is considered to be the internet by many in Myanmar.

  Today, the United Nations said that top Myanmar officials should be investigated and prosecuted for genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. In the wake of the UN’s announcement, Facebook has removed 18 Facebook accounts, one Instagram account, and 52 Facebook Pages, many of which were run by some of Myanmar’s top officials. These accounts were said to have 12 million followers total.

  Facebook spokeswoman Clare Wareing said by email that the social media site took this step, “since international experts, including a UN-commissioned report, have found evidence that many of these officials committed serious human rights abuses in the country.”

  While it’s commendable that Facebook removed these accounts, why did it take a UN indictment before they decided to take action? Secondly, why does Facebook think that removing only 71 accounts will do anything to curb the violence? Ever since Facebook has been implicated in the violence against the Rohingya, they’ve only taken half-measures that have had no real effect on stopping the crisis. Now, Facebook is trying to ride the coattails of the UN by trying to make it look like they’re really doing something about it when any number of these accounts could be relaunched under other names in a matter of moments.

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  Geebo 10:15 am on August 23, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Facebook, hate speech ( 14 ), privacy ( 46 )   

  New issues show Facebook’s loss of control 

  

  Facebook has exploded into the news this week with a number of issues that show how problematic the popular platform has become. The first issue for Facebook was when they announced the deletion of a number of profiles and pages that were from Russia and Iran designed to spread false and inflammatory information into the US and other Western countries. Facebook says they deleted 652 pages, groups, and accounts. While it’s commendable that Facebook removed these accounts, this is only a symptom in a larger problem of continuous foreign influence in Western Democracy.

  Secondly, Facebook announced that, in a move similar to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, four million users may have had their personal data compromised. Facebook has banned an app called MyPersonality, a personality quiz as you can probably surmise. Even though four million users is a drop in the bucket of Facebook’s billions of users worldwide, that’s still a significant number of users whose personal information may have been exposed. While it’s an improvement over the 87 million accounts exposed in the Cambridge Analytica kerfuffle, Facebook seems like it’s still leaking like a sieve with our information.

  Lastly, and probably the most damning, the New York Times published an expose on a study that has linked Facebook use to anti-refugee violence in Germany. While the study doesn’t blame Facebook per se, it does allege that Facebook use paired with engagement into hate-filled rhetoric has resulted in a rise in hate-related violence. What concerns me most about this study is how much Facebook hate-crimes based on ethnicity or religion are coming closer and closer to the US. In today’s charged political climate, how long will it be before Facebook lynch mobs finally leave their keyboards and start taking to the streets?

  Facebook has become a virus that has escaped the lab and is creeping through the world’s population and by continuing to rely so heavily on it we’re willingly ignoring the cure.

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  Geebo 8:59 am on August 17, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: ethnic cleansing ( 8 ), Facebook, Myanmar ( 10 ), Rohingya ( 9 )   

  Facebook failing in the fight to stop ethnic cleansing 

  

  I’ve been posting about Facebook’s role in the persecution of the Rohingya people in Myanmar for a little while now. If you’re unfamiliar with the situation, the Rohingya Muslim minority in the country formerly known as Burma has not only been run out of their homes by the Myanmar military, but they’ve also been the victims of hate crimes and ethnic cleansing that is fueled by the Buddhist majority. The Rohingya are considered to be the most persecuted people currently in the world today. Previously, Facebook has given non-committal answers about their efforts to help stop the human rights abuses in Myanmar, but a new report says Facebook is failing horribly to curb the tide of ethnic violence in the country.

  WARNING: The following video may contain images and language that some may find disturbing.

  A report from Reuters (via CNBC) says that since the problem of ethnic cleansing in Myanmar has been brought to Facebook’s attention, they’ve done little about it. In a country of 100 million people where roughly three-quarters of the population use Facebook as their only news source, Facebook has only employed a handful of people who speak and read Burmese. The Reuters report also found posts that incite violence against the Rohingya going back as far as six years that are still active on the platform. This further shows that Facebook’s global power has gotten way out of their own control to the detriment of humanity.

  Now some in the West may ignore this problem because it doesn’t concern us but think of this. What if this was happening in our country? What if 75% of the population was looking to drive certain ethnicities or religions from the U.S. because of what they read on Facebook. What if that turned into the mass killings of those oppressed people and the government was to look the other way? Then you look at things like the proliferation of hate groups on Facebook in the United States and you have to ask yourself how close are we to becoming like Myanmar?

   
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  Geebo 9:10 am on August 15, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Facebook, politics ( 15 ), social media ( 79 ), study ( 2 )   

  Study identifies who is really harming democracy on Facebook 

  

  By now, we should all be familiar with the stories about how Facebook was allegedly used by foreign influencers and bad actors to try to sway the 2016 Presidential Election. This has been an ongoing issue even up to the recent 2018 Primary Elections. Many in positions of power have called upon Facebook to try to clamp down on this problem, but what if I told you that it wasn’t Russia that was the biggest threat to democracy on Facebook, but rather it was us?

  According to a recent study by the University of Wisconsin–Madison, social media users are less informed about politics than those who refrain from social media. The study contributes this to most social users only skimming their social media feeds rather than taking the time to process or even further pursue the veracity of the information.

  It also doesn’t help that social media is where people go to feel safe in their bubbles of convenience where they would rather regurgitate whatever latest meme fits into their political party loyalty or narrow worldview. If you think I’m singling out one side of the political spectrum over the other, I’m not as both sides of the aisle are guilty of this behavior. So while the typical Facebook user may think he or she is the political scholar in their circle of friends, the odds are they really aren’t and as long as people keep acting and thinking like this democracy will remain threatened from within.

   
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  Geebo 9:28 am on August 10, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Europe, Facebook, migrant crisis ( 3 )   

  Facebook accused of not doing enough to stop the deaths of migrants 

  

  In the recent past, Facebook has been criticized for allowing human rights abuses to have taken place in countries like Myanmar, Sri Lanka, and The Philippines. In many of these cases, human rights organizations have criticized Facebook for not doing enough to stop abuses from happening but Facebook tends to give the rationalizations of the inflammatory content either doesn’t violate their community guidelines or claiming they’re doing all they can. Now, Facebook is being accused of not helping to stop the deaths of migrants trying to escape to Europe.

  Since 2015, refugees from countries in the Middle East and Africa have been fleeing their countries either due to internal violence or human rights abuses. While the number of migrants has decreased since then, 700 refugees have died trying to cross the Mediterranean in dangerously overcrowded vessels. The UK’s National Crime Agency claims that a large part of the problem is illegal smugglers advertising their services on Facebook. Tom Dowdall, deputy director of the NCA says Facebook has the technology to stop these smugglers from posting but doesn’t do enough to prevent them from posting.

  Facebook have developed a fantastic ability to be able to identify patterns and how everybody operates on a day to day basis.

  “This is no different: there will be patterns that are developed here which we know that Facebook and others can be onto really quickly. We need their cooperation to be able to identify and to either close down these sites or be able to further investigate them.”

  Once again, this another example of Facebook’s power and reach getting out of their own control. Since Facebook wants to be all things to all people they can’t seem to grasp that a lot of those people use their platform to do horrible things. It isn’t enough anymore for Facebook to just throw up their hands and say “they’re trying”. They need to start policing themselves before the governments of the world start doing it for them.

   
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  Geebo 9:10 am on August 6, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: blackmail ( 3 ), extortion ( 14 ), Facebook, scam ( 22 )   

  New Facebook extortion scam hits Texas town 

  

  Before the advent of Facebook, craigslist was ground zero for most internet scams. While craigslist is still used for a multitude of scams, a lot of con artists have moved to Facebook due to the sheer number of worldwide users Facebook has. A number of these scams involve blackmail or extortion where the con artist lulls the victim into a false sense of security in order to gain some kind of private information from the victim that the scammer can use for financial gain. In the past, these scammers would try to obtain very intimate photos of the victim before threatening to publish them if the victim didn’t pay. Now, a small Texas town is finding out that the blackmailers don’t even need intimate photos of you to try to extort money from you.

  As reported by NewsWest9.com, police in the city of Floydada, Texas, have been receiving a number of reports about someone trying to blackmail local residents on Facebook. How this new scam works is that the scammer befriends the victim on Facebook in order to get the victim to engage in a video chat. The chat doesn’t even have to be risqué as the scammer just wants an image of your face. Then the scammer superimposes your face onto an explicit photo and threatens to send it to everyone on your friends list if you don’t pay the blackmailers.

  I’m sure you’re asking why you should be concerned about what’s going on in a small city probably nowhere near you. The reason you should be concerned is that if it’s happening in small-town America, it can happen anywhere in the country, even where you live. To protect yourself from this scam don’t accept Facebook messages from people you don’t know personally. Sometimes people will try to pose as someone already on your friends list but under a different profile. Always check to make sure your friends are who they say they are. If you’ve been threatened by one of these scammers, it is never advised to pay them as blackmailers will usually keep requesting money after they receive the first payment. With Facebook recently announcing the testing of their new dating app, I can see this particular scam proliferating in the near future.

   
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  Geebo 10:18 am on August 3, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: check scam ( 79 ), Facebook, Facebook Marketplace ( 62 ), Scams ( 1,355 )   

  Old craigslist scam turning up on Facebook Marketplace 

  

  One of the oldest scams on craigslist, if not the oldest, is what’s known as the fake check scam. A seller will list an item for sale on the questionable classifieds site then they’ll receive a check for more than the amount they’ve asked for. The scammer will say the overpayment is for shipping costs and will ask the seller to return any money over the asking price to be sent back to them. The seller will deposit the check and usually wire the money back to the scammer. The check then turns out to be a fake which ends up leaving the seller on the hook for the amount of the check with their bank.

  More recently a similar scam has been appearing on Facebook Marketplace. The Atlanta Journal-Constitution is reporting that this new twist on the old scam has claimed a few victims in Georgia. Instead of sending a phony check for more than the asking price, the scammer is now said to be asking for the seller’s bank account information so the funds can be transferred electronically. Once again, the money transfer turns out to be a phony transaction so not only does the scammer have your money but they have your bank information as well which puts you at risk for future scams like identity theft.

  Any online marketplace worth its salt will tell you that if something appears too good to be true it usually is. If you go to the main page of Facebook Marketplace it gives no such warning. If you try to find any tips or suggestions on how to deal with unscrupulous buyers or sellers on Marketplace you really have to know what you’re looking for in Facebook’s maze-like structure of resources. There’s no link to click on from the Marketplace page. Instead, you have to join a separate community about Marketplace then hope to find the link that you’re looking for. Then again, I wouldn’t be surprised if scams like this weren’t against Facebook’s vague and arbitrary community guidelines.

   
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  Geebo 9:08 am on August 1, 2018 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: Election ( 21 ), Facebook   

  Facebook deletes pages of suspected agitators 

  

  With the mid-term election cycle in full swing, you’d think that Facebook would be on top of possible foreign entities who might try to meddle in the election process like they did in the run-up to the 2016 Presidential Election. Well, you’d be half right. Yesterday, Facebook announced it had removed 32 pages and accounts that are suspected to have belonged to a campaign to cause political strife in the US.

  Now, when I first read the new articles on the matter I was dismissive of Facebook’s actions considering they only removed 32 accounts. Then I read that some of the pages that were removed had close to 300,000 followers. The allegedly phony pages posed as left-leaning causes. One such page promoted an event called “No Unite the Right 2” which was designed to clash with an alt-right protest on the anniversary of last year’s tragic event in Charlottesville, Virginia, where a counter-protester was killed when a member of the alt-right protesters struck the victim with his car.

  As TIME Magazine points out, this is just the beginning. Even with the billions of dollars at its disposal, Facebook still can’t prevent the flood of misinformation that is probably headed its way for the 2018 elections. If you want to be a truly informed voter this election the best thing to do is to ditch Facebook since they neither have the tools nor the resources to try to stop other entities from interfering in our democratic process.