Mobilized Militias, Meta’s Research Flub, and J.D. Vance on Tech
TTP's July 19th, 2024 Newsletter
Militia Groups Use Social Media to Capitalize on Trump Assassination Attempt
The attempted assassination of former President Donald Trump has spawned a flood of conspiracy theoriesacross social media, as platforms fail to uplift credible information or fact-check false claims. On X, the Community Note system collapsed under a surge of posts claiming the attack had been staged or was the result of a “deep state” plot. Instead of stepping up to fill this gap, X competitor Threads flopped, hamstrung by Meta’s decision to move away from breaking news and politics.
Naturally, this information vacuum created opportunities for bad actors, and signaled to extremist organizations that platforms weren’t serious about content moderation. On Tuesday, journalist Tess Owen reported that armed militia groups were rallying around the assassination attempt on social media, using mainstream platforms to spread their ideology and recruit new members. TTP contributed to the story by providing exclusive research concerning the extremist group American Patriots Three Percenters (APIII), which has been allowed to recruit on Facebook, X, TikTok, and even NextDoor for the past year. All these platforms have policies against violent organizations, but enforcement appears to be minimal; a Facebook “Confederate militia” group, which Owen highlighted by name in her report, remains active three days after her story was published. Meta did not provide a comment.
Meta Pulls Back from Transparency, Leans in on “Research Partnerships”
In late January of 2024, Meta announced that it would be partnering with the non-profit Center for Open Science (COS) to share data surrounding teen well-being on Instagram. The request for proposals was opened this week, along with criteria for participation. To be eligible, proposals must fit into one of four broad research areas, which can include both comparative studies or randomized trials. If the proposed projects are approved by COS, researchers will be invited to submit an Instagram data request to Meta, which will not know the identity of the researchers or the substance of their proposal.
While this approach might seem watertight, it still relies on “independence by permission,” a dynamic that professor Michael Wagner identified when observing another academic partnership at Meta. After sitting in on hundreds of hours of meetings between Meta staff and outside researchers, Wagner concluded that while the studies had been sound, they were fundamentally limited by Meta guardrails. As he told Justin Hendrix at Tech Policy Press, the researchers were prevented from developing interventions on Meta platforms, meaning they couldn’t build new design features to see increased or decreased polarization. Instead of having access to raw data, researchers had to work hand-in-hand with Meta staff to make specific requests, and ultimately operated with less knowledge of the company’s data systems. Unfortunately, the new teen mental health studies are bound by the same constraints; researchers can assign Instagram use to different treatment groups, but will not able to test the impact of platform modifications on user wellbeing.
As Meta wades into these sharply limited research partnerships, it is also sunsetting CrowdTangle, a social media analysis tool used to monitor content across Facebook and Instagram. Instead of continuing support for this system, the company has decided to replace it with the more restrictive and less accessible Meta Content Library, which most journalists will be unable to use.
Examining J.D. Vance’s Investments in Far-Right Streaming Platform Rumble
Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) is set to run as the Republican nominee for Vice President, meaning his legislative track record has come under intense scrutiny – along with his ties to tech billionaire Peter Thiel. After a brief stint in law, Vance joined a venture capital firm run by Thiel, who became his mentor and eventually bankrolledhis run for Senate. Today, Vance and Thiel remain invested in Rumble, the streaming platform that partneredwith the RNC to host primary debates and claims to be “immune to cancel culture.” While many social media companies are slow to enforce policies against hate and extremism, Rumble has proven particularly slow to remove this content, and continues to host videos from creators like Andrew Tate and Russel Brand who have been banned from other platforms. Last year, Rumble infamously monetized a series of neo-Nazi videos with ads for Trump’s campaign, and has been criticized for continuing to platform antisemitic conspiracy theories.
As TTP noted in a 2023 report, Vance has adopted an unusual approach to social media regulation that would likely give Rumble a big advantage over its mainstream competitors: an exemption from liability. During a 2022 campaign speech, Vance suggested dismantling the Section 230 liability shield for larger tech companies while leaving it in place for “new entries,” to “destroy the stranglehold” of Big Tech. This approach favors smaller platforms like Rumble, which would be free to recommend hateful or dangerous content to users without facing consequences.
What We’re Reading:
Meta Has a Trump Dilemma of Its Own Making
AI is overpowering efforts to catch child predators, experts warn
Group in charge of Google's $100M for news outlets lays out its governance model