Like many I am grateful to the Guardian newspaper for its work on Cambridge Analytica. Its expose of the use of data trawled from Facebook to seek to subvert choice in elections is well worth another year's voluntary payments, however much I get annoyed by the paper on occasion.
But in amongst all the issues raised I want to point out the big one that is not being stated clearly enough. The challenge to democracy that the Guardian has exposed does not come from Russia. Nor is the issue particular to Cambridge Analytica. And I doubt it is peculiar to Facebook either. The challenge to democracy comes from capitalism itself.
If anyone used the weaknesses in the systems of Facebook for their own ends (and it seems certain that they did: that was Cambridge Analaytica's raison d'etre) then this was not a case of ‘bad apples'. This happened because capitalism is designed to exploit weaknesses in pursuit of profit unless prevented from doing so.
Facebook let data be used because it thought it would profit from it.
Cambridge Analytica looks to be a company without a moral compass. But there are a multitude of those.
And the cost is to society at large. The fact that in this case the cost is very large indeed, maybe resulting in the world having to suffer Trump as US President and in the UK opting for Brexit. As costs go, these are staggering.
And yet they are only the specific costs. The systemic ones may be larger still. The greater cost is to trust.
Bizarrely, the whole edifice of capitalism has to be built on trust. In the absence of the perfect information that economists assume exists as the basis for their prescription that markets deliver the optimal allocation of resources within the global economy, trust that the purveyor of any product or service can be relied upon to supply the product as described is essential to the effective operation of markets. Ultimately, it is what we all have to rely upon. That we cannot do so is indicated by the fact that we have so much regulation. But even so, trust remains at the heart of the system. And so pervasive is that requirement that the whole edifice of governance, whether within business, or beyond in greater society is built on the same basis.
The actions of Facebook and Cambridge Analytica shake that assumption that we might trust the corporate world to its core. Of course, they are not the first companies to have done that. They will not be the last. But their cases are exceptional in one way, and indication of what might be to come in another. Few companies have ever had data on a quarter of the world's population before now. And few that we know of have used that so ruthlessly, and apparently with so little conscience, to seek to undermine the system of democracy that is, in my opinion, essential in providing the checks and balances that are the only things that make any form of capitalism acceptable. This can only get worse if unchecked now.
In that case might I make a quiet plea? Might we stop obsessing about Russia? If they have exploited this they are just one of many who might have, or have been willing, to do so. Lowest common denominator market players will find customers. Instead might we ask what it is about capitalism that must be transformed (I use the word rather than reformed, wisely) to ensure that what it can do - which is provide us with choices and the opportunity for billions to work in the ways they wish using their skills in the way they want - might be of best service to human kind without putting at risk the whole of society as we know it?
This has to start with changing the rules of the game. The idea that limited liability is sacrosanct, most especially for those who run companies, has to end. Such a provision may be appropriate for shareholders. For directors who permit wrong doing it cannot be permitted.
Nor can the assumption that capitalism can operate behind closed doors be sustained any more. We know government has been improved by the right to know. Maybe the time for freedom of information enquiries of big business has arrived.
And, of course, the interests of shareholders cannot come first. They are important, but only amongst equals. That means employees, suppliers, customers, government, communities and civil society rank equal alongside them. As does the environment, even if it has to rely on human custodians to act for it.
Whilst the boundaries of what companies may do may have to be re-written.
And the whole idea of audit may need to come in to vogue once more, with a focus not just on accounting but on governance, ethics and community risk. And it is not an activity that could be done in pursuit of commercial profit.
Whilst if we are serious about defending democracy - and I am - the idea that seeking to subvert democratic choice must be an offence has to be taken seriously.
I accept these ideas need development, and discussion. But my point is clear. Let's not get lost in the detail of the abuse Cambridge Analytica has undertaken. Let's look as well at the systemic issues that they and Facebook raise. They are much more important. And existential in nature.
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I have often been prompted to click on something asking for permission to access my basic Facebook data and generally I am happy to accept, and if that contributes to a model that lets people better target me with products I might want then all the better for it. If they make a bad model or if I am not representative of my group then I can simply ignore those adds or even better say I don’t like it for them to then update my preferences.
If, and I think it is currently uncertain if this is the case (obviously unconsentual data taking is bad), all Facebook data was obtained consentually and used to build models in an anonymised form what exactly is the objection?
I have never sought to increase my security on Facebook, despite many prompts, because I actually want to engage with a wide spectrum of people. I know, now, how to get rid of nasty trolls – just the one and recently. I can easily ignore ads – I’m not much of a catch there as I share little on FB of my buying tastes which are extremely boring. But my posts have been scraped in order to attempt to get me chucked out of the Labour Party. I was suspended a couple of years ago accused of breaking the rules on ‘recruitment’, which was untrue, I got reinstated quickly (thanks to NEC friends) but never got the apology which was owed. FB was undoubtedly the source used by those who seek to undermine Corbyn. I have recently been threatened by the Campaign Against Antisemitism who infiltrated a closed FB group of which I am a member. The same email was sent to many of us on that group. But I suspect that the CAA also linked me with a letter I wrote to the Morning Star, posted on FB, on how support for the Palestinians has been weaponised. I don’t think they’re going to succeed, but I guess I should be more careful.
It’s sad that we have to be so careful
And then I look at some of those who seek to post here…..
“Facebook data was obtained consentually (sic) and used to build models in an anonymised form what exactly is the objection? ”
People who don’t understand what is going on are not qualified to consent. Personally I regard that as significant and I think you will find that there are instances where that opinion is reinforced in law.
Oh right Angus,
So its all just about you and what may or not bother you personally?
You say: “If, and I think it is currently uncertain if this is the case (obviously unconsentual data taking is bad), all Facebook data was obtained consentually and used to build models in an anonymised form what exactly is the objection?”
1. “Consentual” is nonsense, generally speaking, when it is derived from the 20-odd incomprehensible pages of ‘terms and conditions’ that every one just clicks ‘yes’ to without reading because there is no real choice and no other way of accessing the internet.
2. If you can’t already see an objection to the idea of an anonymous political scum outfit targeting isolated individuals with fake news propaganda items that deliberately delete themselves and can’t be traced, then I’m not sure that I can explain to you.
Agreed
Is ‘take it or leave it’ from a monopolist consensual?
Agreed. Breach of public trust is I believe a custodial sentence and personally I think this section of Law is underused. Put in by those wise men of old to forestall and punish those that undermined society’s trust, most probably because of causing scares to create a run on a rival banks depositors.
I notice that with the SNAC Shareholder Nomination to the Agm Committee proposal now being put to 250,000 shareholders to give them the ability to have a few wise informed self interested large shareholders reassert their power to select and appoint Directors and more. It’s not that the power had gone it had been forgotten.
The same with old branches of Law. Using Criminal law instead of civil and forcing companies to punish and prosecute their own or ex employees would save the conspiracy of Defence and fraud by using shareholders funds to deny shareholder justice or compensation for example RB S have stalled on paying out £200 million + in compensation to shareholders defrauded by the 12bn rights issue prospectus. It’s time for shareholders to reassert control before the big active shareholder like Hermes are consumed by vested interests.
It’s not just trust in CEO’s that’s required, the entire monetary system is based on faith. I think the single biggest change would be to rewrite corporate law so that shareholder value is no longer the first responsibility of a corporation. It has allowed, even lionised, schopathic and parasitical behaviour. If ethics and value to society where the legal primary aim then tax dodging, deliberate environmental destruction and unethical data mining would all carry negative personal costs.
Whilst we can regulate for specific corporate malfeasance (GDPR for the data world) it will always be a game of whack a mole whilst the law incentives corporate anti social behaviour.
Agreed
And this must be done all over the world
Mark James Talbot says:
” the single biggest change would be to rewrite corporate law so that shareholder value is no longer the first responsibility of a corporation.”
Yep. Agree entirely. You can’t knock the boa(astar)rd for meeting the job spec.
If the job spec is wrong you get a bad result.
I wonder who wrote the rules of engagement. Notice the lack of question mark there.
Long term shareholder value is ignored in favour of CEOs using it as an excuse for short term personal gain. Eg reckless lending and ABN amro takeover to fudge the figures with acquisition accounting despite huge objections by shareholders. The CEOs have exploited the disengagement of big shareholders abusing the trust of shareholders for their own ends aided by overseas investment bankers and pyrrhic victory’s like causing compulsory voting by shareholders.
Long term shareholder value is ignored in favour of CEOs using the excuse and words to justify as an excuse for their short term personal gain. Eg reckless lending and ABN amro takeover to fudge the figures with acquisition accounting despite huge objections by shareholders collecting a new bonus and more power.
The CEOs have exploited the disengagement of big shareholders thus abusing the trust of the remaining shareholders for their own ends aided by overseas investment bankers seeking takeover fees and encouraging various politicians in pyrrhic victory’s like causing compulsory voting by shareholders.
Understanding and seeing behind the veil, through the fog to the underlying reality is the first step. Transparency of what brought us to this situation and the real interests of those involved.
Then you can fix the causes of the problem and the causes of the problems that caused them. SNAC committees or a small group of commuted individuals gathered can do that. Did divided we fall otherwise
It was sad to hear the Cambridge academic defending himself on Radio 4 today against attacks from FB and CA. He said he had not profited from the work he did for CA and I assume that is so. But it is the way that universities now have to prostitute themselves in the market rather than being properly funded from the state which is to blame.
Agreed
“He said he had not profited from the work he did for CA and I assume that is so.”
I would not be quite so sure about that just yet although I would ignore FB and CA’s attempts to shove all of the blame on to him
Having seen him on the telly now I’m indeed not so sure;o)
Read this http://bellacaledonia.org.uk/2018/03/20/scl-a-very-british-coup/
As the lady said of the turtles, it’s corruption all the way down.
It seems apparent to me that the change required is to keep psychopaths and power separate. They are running governments and large companies (banks etc), and looks like our richest citizens fit the bill too.
Now there is a challenge.
Yes, but that’s due to the incentive being profit maximilization before ethics leads to those who don’t care about others or at least look the other way being the ones who do best at it.
However, Facebook is voluntary. I am not on Facebook because it is extra time and maybe hassle. So the information on it is given freely by those who give. On the other hand never give suckers an even break.
You may not have a Facebook account, but you may be surprised to find out how much data Facebook has cobbled together about you from your friends and family and public information. (Perhaps I am mistaken, but as I understand it, they maintain shadow profiles for non-subscribers.)
Now, can someone explain to me how my friends and family can possibly give consent for Facebook to process personal data about me? Or indeed to aggregate, store and process data about me that is available from public sources? I have never registered for a Facebook account and have no intention of doing do.
Andrew says:
“You may not have a Facebook account, but you may be surprised to find out how much data Facebook has cobbled together about you…”
I feel a sudden subversive urge to ‘update’ my facebook profile with untruths.
I regularly received a glossy catalogue about dog food, for years, as a response to a paper survey many years ago in which I was getting bored and told ‘it’ I had seven dogs and fifteen cats.
It wouldn’t take long to make data mining a fairly useless (and expensive) activity if enough people supplied a quantity of misinformation.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/epdf/10.1111/1467-923X.12456
Looks good….
Nice one , quite appropriate.
Nothing will change, give it a week or two and we can move on to the next scandal,the world is awash with this sort of stuff,the plebs couldn,t care less, facebook is the new religion where people spill there guts to any one who,ll listen, moral compass thats so yesterday.Keep up the good work,mro.
My understanding was that democracy was only preferable to other political systems due to two reasons:
* The greater ease of removing bad government – no violent revolution necessary, the ballot box will suffice.
* It is difficult for any small group to capture power and pervert the state, as a majority of the voting population must be convinced (exact proportion of the population that must be convinced depending upon specific voting system ect).
This makes it difficult for bad ideas difficult to gain traction – ideally that is, I understand that this does not always work perfectly – but it never will.
Combined these allow for the state to, albeit slowly, evolve towards the “best” case. I put best in quote marks because it is not any objective or moral best, but merely the equilibrium of the current voting system – i.e politicians will be optimised to win elections etc, not to be good leaders, although there will be some overlap between the two (I hope!).
What the recent revelations about mass (mis)information, manipulation and data theft make abundantly clear is that the second point is now no longer true.
Furthermore, it is unlikely to ever be true again.
Therefore democracy as a system no longer has the validity that our society gives it.
This doesn’t not intrinsically bother me, for I have no axiomatic moral preference for it.
However a replacement must be found, and this does bother me for I do not know how to do this.
However all so far tried method of political organisation fail to meet either of the above two points.
A regression to an even worse system, such as absolutism or a literal oligarchy would just dose the problems with steroids and get them drunk – not a fun time for anyone.
So the challenge is then not to save democracy, for in its current form it is already dead and should not be saved, but to come up with an alternative system.
This must have a repeatable, iterate-able , way of replacing bad governance with good, and prevent violence from being this mechanism.
It must also act to prevent itself from regressing to less suitable forms of governance.
QSR wrote:
“What the recent revelations about mass (mis)information, manipulation and data theft make abundantly clear is that the second point (making it difficult for any small group to capture power and pervert the state) is now no longer true. Furthermore, it is unlikely to ever be true again.”
Since the Cambridge Analytica/Facebook story broke I’ve been trying to find less depressing way to interpret it, but I find I have to agree with QSR’s view. The digital genie is well and truly out of the bottle and, following widespread piracy of the low-hanging fruit of intellectual property, the brigands have moved on to the more lucrative field of opinion-shaping where legal constraints are looser and harder to enforce. The result: whatever passes for democracy anywhere in the world is now under threat of wilful subversion by a small group of activists whose only motivation is financial reward.
I watched the Channel 4 footage of their discussions with Nix and Turnbull and the abiding impression I gained was that these two are entirely morally bankrupt. They might sub-contract the dodgier elements to avoid obvious reputational damage, but they’d be happy and willing to facilitate any kind of dubious (if not outright illegal) activity if it improves their client’s aims and gets them their no doubt very sizeable fees. That the client might be trying to do something illegal or damaging or subversive seems to be of no importance.
How to fix this, apart from prosecutions, jailings etc (which might be hard to achieve)? If we put this crew in jail, we can be sure that another crew will fill the void PDQ. We can’t enforce anything in other countries either, so the players can flit around the globe and ply their trade from anywhere. We have to fix the problem within our territory first and foremost and co-operate with other governments facing similar problems.
A place to start, as with so many topics discussed here, is having governance that better represents public opinion. PR anyone?
8 think you have found the best solution
PR it is
Beat the polarisation
I think a lottery allocation of MP’s from all potential voters would prevent capture by an oligarchic elite.
Doesn’t do much for optimising for better government though.
(sorry for double commenting Richard)
To clarify my second comment above, PR ( in a single house of parliament), would I think be better than the current system.
But by itlsef I think it would be a temporary bandage and, as manipulation of public opinion is the “genie out of the bottle”, I fear that PR is still susuecptible to mass manipulation of the public.
It would make it much harder though.
I am not sure how true it is, but I get the impression that in the UK( and USA) the de facto 2 party systems makes shifting the vote of a small minority sufficient to manipulate the whole election.
This is, for obvious reasons, much easier than manipulating the opinions of a majority of the populace- as would be needed in a full PR system.
Although I personally have a strong, and I admit emotionally caused, negative reaction to political parties, and thus harbour deep scepticism about PR for this reason ( as It entrenches political parties and their candidate selection).
Capitalism? That’s not really the fundamental nature of the threat. Neoliberal capitalism and what ever one might apply the label capitalism before that are products, not causes. The threat as numerous social scientists and philosophers have observed is the Janus face of Enlightenment rationality. Reason can be put to good or bad ends, and the bad ends are certainly rather more than “capitalism”. The danger is reason as an end in itself; reason divorced from an ethics of practice that respects the will of others. Or even worse, reason that becomes the only legimate will, politics reduced to technical (economic) reason. The modus operandi of Cambridge Analytica (Facebook, Google, Amazon, the NSA, GCHQ, ONS, etc.) isn’t fundamentally different from what has been the hallmark of the modern period: data collection and statistical analysis to manage/manipulate populations. Computers and networks vastly increase the efficiency of the process. The quantity and speed at which data can be collected and analyzed is now vastly greater and access is no longer strictly the realm of government. But these are matters of scale and distribution; the way reason can be used to get a grip on populations and manipulate them is the same today as it was in 19th and 18th Cs. And, as a certain French philosopher observed many decades ago, you are kidding yourself if you think socialism would operate differently.
Wikipedia is not always accurate but this entry reads like an open conspiracy of the ‘One Percent’.
There are a number of familiar names here-Koch brothers, Mercer, Breibart and Cambridge Analytica. Should we be surprised that there appears to be a co-ordinated effort by bright, energetic and ruthless men to consolidate their power? I would be more surprised if there were not.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Mercer_(businessman)
“Like many I am grateful to the Guardian newspaper…..”
For printing on sheets larger than the standard tabloid. Have you ever tried wrapping a family size Brown Betty teapot in a sheet of tabloid ?
For white china it would be better if they didn’t use ink.
” ….expose ……” Nnnngggghhhh..
I noticed …yesterday (?) that you know how to strike-out text.
For an ‘e’ acute try: Alt zero two three three.
I works on my machine. You have to hold the Alt down and you don’t need to key ‘e’.
And it only works on the number pad, not on the numeral keys at the top of the keyboard.
Exposé .
Happy birthday. I’m afraid that’s the best present I can offer, though I’d love to send you a bottle of Glencadam as produced in my vicinity. (Probably not available at your local off licence or wine merchant.)
And an iPad just didn’t want to do that for me…so you got the best I could do
I can live with my perfections
Most especially now I am old…
ERM…
Sixty is not (f**king) old. So don’t think you are going to be able to pull that one and get away with it.
Not on here anyway. We’ve had someone on here just this week who remembers phlogiston and someone else who knows what he’s talking about so just don’t try it on, Sonny 🙂
On an iPad, just hold down the “e” key for a moment and a little box should pop up offering you a choice of diacritics, including dot, cedilla, macron, breve, grave, acute, umlaut, etc.
I did not know that ….
I’ve just noticed this, Richard, and it amuses me greatly this morning:
“I can live with my perfections”
I think I may adopt it as a catchphrase. Better still I could have it blazened on my escutcheon. 🙂
“In the absence of the perfect information that economists assume exists as the basis for their prescription that markets deliver the optimal allocation of resources within the global economy,….”
I can’t read this without falling over bullshit. Why FFS does any sentient being believe this ?
Why is it so difficult to persuade people that they are being spun a line ?
A cow wouldn’t believe this.
Andy says:
“Why FFS does any sentient being believe this ?” “A cow wouldn’t believe this”
Upton Sinclair says:
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it.”
That idea works in reverse as well.
Oh well, it was a better that reply than some tiresome critique of Pareto Optimality.
“Oh well, it was a better that reply than some tiresome critique of Pareto Optimality.”
A kindness indeed to spare us that 🙂
But (ya bad bugger!) you know damn fine I’m going to have to Google ‘Pareto Optimality’ now don’t you ?
“you know damn fine I’m going to have to Google ‘Pareto Optimality’ now don’t you ?”
Yep,
and you are going to hate it so much.
I shouldn’t have gone right back to the top I fell over this:
“.. The challenge to democracy that the Guardian has exposed does not come from Russia…..”
And I thought, after the exchanges of the last few days. “Thank heavens for that.” 😐
“Lowest common denominator market players will find customers…”
I suppose that is one way of paraphrasing the observation that ‘no one ever lost money overestimating the stupidity of the American consumer’
Or closer to home…
There is not anything that can be made that some [person] cannot make a little worse and a little cheaper, and the [person] who considers price alone is this [person’s] lawful prey.
(Ruskin, I think. Hat tip to Peter Bradshaw, erstwhile of Rotaprint, if he’s still alive. Yes, I even remember your name, Peter although it’s …forty years ago.)
thats a great angle on the debate!
I do take issue with the idea of subverting democracy.
first, the claims to swing elections are completely grandiose, to do that you have to change opinions and these technologies are entrenching opinions not changing them.
second, the narratives and tactics used to subvert democracy in the current revelations are what some elements of the media have been doing since the advent of the printing press. or to be blunt, just look at the stories in the daily mail every morning and tell me thats not subverting democracy!
Oh come on
This does change minds
Do not pretend otherwise
where is the evidence or study that shows it effected peoples voting choices? Cambridge Analytica’s claims are rapped up in assumptions about techniques that have never been proven. there is nothing new in what is happening here, data mining goes back to myspace and beyond and advertisers have been trying out these techniques for over 10 years with little success. Facebooks data is about targeting preferences, and putting those preferences in the hands of advertises, that has proven to be the most effective use of data, thats why Facebook is so successful. I don’t approve of this but its just common place, just install google Chrome along with an internet monitoring tool like NetLimiter (windows) or little snitch (Mac) and you will see what data mining is all about. in fact just install the monitor and see what your computer is communicating behind your back.
Advertising is the Wild West of the internet and data mining is central to it, don’t expect any real change soon.
With respect, I hear lots of people who say ‘advertising does not work on me’
And they’s stacked in debt to buy the latest consumer goody
You may think these techniques do not work
I suggest there’s not a shred of evidence that suggests that people are not impacted by tailoring the messages they receive
@Neil Harvey “where is the evidence or study that shows it effected peoples voting choices?” The targetting of Bernie Sanders’ supporters to try to stop them voting for Clinton sounded quite convincing to me. The result was very tight and this could have easily made the difference.
“With respect, I hear lots of people who say ‘advertising does not work on me’”
The only people who are consistently immune are those who literally cannot afford the product or service advertised. Propaganda is more subtle because it tends to skirt round the issue of cost.
On advertising generally it used to be a given within the industry (or so I was told) that ‘everybody knows’ half an advertiser’s budget is wasted, but even the experts couldn’t be sure which half.
“….tactics used to subvert democracy …”
This really is a rats’ nest.
Manipulation of the ‘Free press’ narrative does go all the way back to the earliest days of newspapers. The essential freedom of the press seems to be to say whatever the proprietor/editor wants to say. We accept this, because ’twas ever thus; every ‘newspaper’ has its well known political slant.
‘Everybody knows’…. you can’t believe what you read in the papers. Or at least that’s what they say, but the reality is quite clearly that ‘everybody’ does.
What we are facing at present, I think, is the use of a new medium and we don’t yet understand how it behaves and we certainly don’t know how to regulate it. (Who would we trust to regulate it, in a ‘post-trust society?) Frankly I don’t think we do a very competent job of regulating traditional media. Retractions are always hidden in the inside pages, on the rare occasions when blatant headline lies are successfully challenged. By then the ‘damage’ is done anyway. Words can not be unsaid.
The internet has made available a vast amount of information, to anyone with a connection to it, we have to learn to deal with it because, as ever, much of what we are ‘told’ is simply not true, or at best incomplete, partial and designed to sway our opinions and thus our behaviour.
The key to the future is education. We must learn to process vast amounts of ‘noise’.
The rubbish and the lies and the half truths will never go away. And always the best, most well-meaning ‘science’ we have from the most respected sources is only today’s best guess.
We crave certainty in an uncertain world. We are doomed to be disappointed.
But we don’t have to stop seeking and enquiring after nuggets of ‘truth’ even though we will never find the motherlode.
Happy Birthday, Richard!
My first thought on reading your excellent piece: “we” will continue to obsess about Russia, not because the government and press really are obsessed, but because the mere word “Russia” has long been a perfect dog-whistle to reign in any critical thinking. Russia (and before that the Soviet Union) is the perfect “enemy without”, a perfect distraction from current domestic problems…and of course our Brexit woes. This Salisbury incident has been a gift for those wishing to silence sensible discussion.
I fear so