Tech
Facebook Punishes Groups For Questioning Human Impact on Climate Change
Facebook continues to use its weight to change public discourse.
Facebook is now punishing groups on its platform that question the impact of human activity on climate change.
The Facebook group “God Emperor Trump: (Official)” received notification on Monday that members of their group had posted content that is rated false by the platform’s chosen fact checkers, something that Big League Politics revealed the platform will use to demolish the group’s frequency on the news feed, prevent potential new members from being shown the group, and otherwise reduce its engagement and growth.
The content Facebook claimed was inaccurate was a video featuring the famous businessman and public speaker Dan Pena, who says that the extent of man’s impact on climate change is overblown because the business world does not even acknowledge it as a fact.
According to Pena, if the world was set to be submerged due to impacts of human caused global warming in as soon as 12 years, there would be no investment in coastal areas like Florida, which would certainly sink, and that climate change is highly cyclical and it is naive to assume humans have such a large impact on the planet.
The article Facebook used to fact check the claim hardly demolishes Pena’s point, but rather says he may be inaccurate.
Factually Inaccurate: The speaker likely means to refer to a climate period known as the Eemian, but this was about 125,000 years ago, not 55,000 years ago. The slow-changing cycles of Earth’s orbit were in a different configuration then, leading to warmer temperatures.
Flawed Reasoning : The existence of past climate changes does not indicate humans cannot change climate today any more than the existence of natural fires in the past would indicate arson is impossible today.
At this point Facebook not only requires that volunteer moderators determine the veracity of news, but also that they become well read on the intricacies of climate science and use this knowledge to police opinions and content.
This campaign against so-called “false news” in groups has been happening for some time, and could be easily weaponized. If users were to gain access to partisan Facebook groups from the other side of the aisle, they could easily use this feature to post blatantly fake news in an effort to decrease the engagement and reach of groups.
Big League Politics reported in April:
After a user in the Facebook group “God Emperor Trump: Official” posted an article the website considers fake, admins of the group were given a notification that their entire group could be penalized if the behavior is repeated.
According to Facebook’s message, the platform will use its endless fight against “false news” as an excuse to “push all of that group’s content down in News Feed, which may mean fewer people visit the group.”
The platform “may also stop suggesting that people join the group.”
This latest move to prohibit users from questioning the controversial topic of climate change comes shortly after the big tech platform purged Alex Jones, Paul Joseph Watson, Milo Yiannopoulos, and Laura Loomer from both Facebook and Instagram, going as far as to prohibit users from sharing links or videos featuring Jones under threat of a potential ban.
Tech
Gab Attacked in Coordinated Hacking Attempt, Timed to Coincide with CPAC
This hack coincided with Trump’s CPAC speech.
Free speech social media platform Gab was attacked in a coordinated hacking operation sometime this weekend, with malicious actors briefly compromising accounts of prominent users of the platform.
Gab founder Andrew Torba disclosed the cyberattack, revealing that left-wing operatives had sought to compromise both his own Gab account and an archive account reserved for President Donald Trump. The attack compromised Trump’s reserved account minutes before the President was slated to speak on-stage at CPAC- with the timing suggesting the President may announce he’s joining the free speech social media service.
It’s unclear which other accounts were targeted. Torba confirmed that Gab was cooperating with law enforcement in response to the breach. Alt-tech competitor Parler also suffered from frequent data breaches and insecurity, and it may be that powerful institutions determined to take down Parler have shifted their focus to terroristic tactics targeting Gab.
Gab has been targeted on previous occasions by entities that oppose its mission to restore free speech on the internet. Torba’s disclosure of the incident differs greatly from the deceptive business tactics of Facebook and Twitter, which regularly decline to reveal data breaches and sell user information to corporations and governments at a whim and without any user consent.
Big League Politics is monitoring the situation for any further developments.
Follow me on Gab @WildmanAZ, Twitter @Wildman_AZ, and on Parler @Moorhead.
-
White House2 days agoSecret Service Members Confirm That Joe Biden’s Mental Faculties are Indeed in “Bad Shape,” Dan Bongino Says
-
Around The World3 days agoBiden Authorizes Attack on Syria, Kamala FURIOUS It Wasn’t Her Call
-
White House4 days agoSLEEPY? Biden Yet to Deliver First State of the Union Amid Confused Public Appearances
-
Free Speech2 days agoWikipedia’s Founder is Creating New Free Speech Competitor to Website, Citing Leftist Domination
-
Free Speech3 days agoTrump Preparing Case Before “Facebook Supreme Court” to Restore Platform Access
-
States4 days agoSICK: California Bill Proposes to Fine Retailers That Maintain Separate Clothing and Toys Sections for Boys and Girls
-
States4 days agoMichigan Republicans Demand Inquiry Into Gov. Gretchen Whitmer’s Murderous COVID-19 Nursing Home Policies
-
Congress2 days agoArizona’s Paul Gosar Proposes Amending Coronavirus Package to Replace Pork with $10,000 Stimulus Checks
