Facebook is getting ready for the US midterm elections by building a literal “war room” and seeking to win the “arms race” against “bad actors,” a company boss said in remarks that seemed like they were pulled from the Cold War.
Facebook’s head of civic engagement, Samidh Chakrabarti, highlighted progress made by the tech giant in tackling “misinformation” and “fake news” in an interview with NBC published on Tuesday.
The platform has become really effective over the past two years in “combating foreign interference” and blocking and deleting unwanted “fake accounts,” according to the top executive.
“I think we are in a much better place than we were in 2016. But it is an arms race. And so that’s why we’re remaining ever vigilant, laser focused to make sure that we can stay ahead of new problems that emerge,” Chakrabarti stated.
Just like in a real “arms race,” the ranks of Facebook’s “safety and security” personnel have inflated two-fold compared to a year ago. The company now employs 20,000 people in its security team, which includes “trained intelligence investigators” and “computational data scientists” who operate an advanced AI system to find “needles in a haystack,” Chakrabarti said.
Bet they try and make it as hackproof and unlistenable in on as possible. Then they invite their buddies round to figure out what they can do to survive longer than Trump.
h/t keybored