Mark Zuckerberg and Facebook Inc failing to protect Australian voters from malicious or false flag sites

 PHOTO: This sponsored post caught the
attention of the AEC due to
it failing to disclose who paid
 for the advertisement on Facebook. 
(Supplied)

ABC News, 26 February 2019:

It became known as Mark Zuckerberg's "apology tour" — a string of contrite appearances before politicians in Washington and Brussels last year, where the Facebook founder vowed to stop the spread of fake news and voter manipulation on his platform.

"From now on, every advertiser who wants to run political or issue ads will need to be authorised. To get authorised, advertisers will need to confirm their identity and location," told a US Senate committee in April last year.

"We're starting in the US and expanding to the rest of the world in the coming months."

But internal documents obtained by the ABC reveal a very different message coming from Facebook's Australian headquarters.

Just months after Mr Zuckerberg's testimony, the social media giant was pushing back against efforts by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) to identify the users behind potentially illegal political ads.

Almost a year later and on the eve of the federal election, Facebook is yet to bring its new authorisation rules for political ads to Australia.

The threat of political interference on social media during the campaign has become so serious that the AEC has warned Facebook and Twitter they face court-ordered injunctions if they cannot remove illegal political ads.

Facebook's attitude revealed in FOI documents

The surprisingly informal, somewhat haphazard, relationship between the AEC and Facebook is laid bare in a series of emails and other documents obtained as part of freedom of information application.

The AEC contacted Facebook after it became concerned about a mysterious group called Hands Off Our Democracy, which was paying for sponsored posts attacking left-wing groups and political parties last year.

On July 4 last year, AEC lawyer Andrew Johnson told Facebook's senior counsel Sophie Malloch in an email that the commission had received a complaint regarding Hands Off Our Democracy's Facebook page, which "does not contain an authorisation to indicate who is responsible for the page".

"Can you please advise who is responsible for the Hands Off Our Democracy Page and their contact details," Mr Johnson wrote.

"If this is not possible, we ask that this Facebook page is blocked or removed until it complies with the authorisation requirements in the Electoral Act."

Under changes introduced to the act last year, all online advertisements that deal with electoral matters must include the name and address of a person responsible for the ad.

The Hands Off Our Democracy Facebook page carried no information about who was behind the group, and a post on its own website made clear that its members had chosen to remain anonymous.

                                                                                                                    

Facebook initially appeared willing to help the AEC make sure those ads carried the required authorisation, but did not provide the AEC with any information about who was behind the page.

"I passed this along to our govt case work team as an urgent escalation to see what can be done about this page, including whether it can be geoblocked until an authorisation is included," Ms Malloch wrote in her reply to Mr Johnson.

But five days later, Ms Malloch sent a follow-up email, brushing aside the AEC's concerns.

PHOTO: Emails obtained by the ABC under FOI show a difference of opinion in exchanges between the AEC and Facebook. (Supplied)

"The Hands Off Democracy page appears to contain organic user content, rather than advertising paid for through Facebook's online advertising process, and does not seem to require authorisation," she wrote.

"If you have a different view please let me know."

Mr Johnson responded by sending a screenshot of a sponsored post by Hands Off Our Democracy, which attacked The Greens and the activist group GetUp! and did not include the correct authorisation.

"The Australian Greens and GetUp! are against laws strengthening our national security. Why? BECAUSE THEY WANT THEIR FOREIGN DONATIONS," the ad reads.

Mr Johnson said the screenshot indicated the group's page "has (or did have) sponsored content".

A series of email exchanges between Mr Johnson and Ms Malloch followed, in which the pair discussed whether the page should carry authorisation information.

But before the AEC's concerns were addressed, Hands Off Our Democracy's page disappeared from Facebook.

Finally, on August 14 — more than a month after the matter was raised with Facebook — Ms Malloch conceded that the page was indeed paying for ads.

"It appears that this page was removed by the administrator before we could take any action, but yes you are correct — the "sponsored" posts were ads," she wrote….

Australians 'interested in Donald Trump' targeted with ads.

PHOTO: Some ads were targeted toward Australians 'interested in Donald Trump.' (Supplied)

PHOTO: The Hands Off Democracy page also sponsored conspiracy posts about US billionaire George Soros. (Supplied)

Newcastle Herald, 27 February 2019:

Facebook is investigating a complaint from Port Stephens Labor MP Kate Washington who has alleged fake accounts are being used to manipulate the electoral process. 

Ms Washington has written to the Clerk of the NSW Parliament calling for an investigation into the four accounts, which she suspects may be controlled by a Liberal Party supporter.

The accounts, which appear to be owned by local constituents, have been posting in sync with Liberal Party announcements in the Port Stephens electorate in recent weeks.

The Newcastle Herald sent direct messages to the accounts on Monday morning seeking to speak with account owners.

After advising a staff member of Port Stephens Liberal Duty MLC Catherine Cusack of Ms Washington's complaint at lunchtime on Tuesday three of the four accounts responded to the Herald within an hour.

None of the profile users was prepared to speak with the Herald.

One of accounts, which appeared to be operated by a woman who said she had campaigned tirelessly for residents in the Red Zone, was deleted on Tuesday afternoon. 

Another account was deleted on Wednesday night.

So-called social media trolling and claims of harassment, from both major parties, have become common place in recent state and federal election campaigns.

Quote of the Week

“The simple truth is that, when you go for years abusing your market power, the electorate eventually wakes up and hits back, threatening to toss out any government that isn’t prepared to set things to rights.” [Economics Editor Ross Gittens writing in The Sydney Morning Herald, 25 February 2019]

Tweet of the Week

In #SenateEstimates right now they're discussing Robodebt & a spate of suicides, this public servant is saying that because suicide victims are no longer here, by definition, then any causality cannot be proven between the Robodebt and the suicide.

I shit you not.#auspol pic.twitter.com/M2Fqb9JS55

— Bee (@BelindaJones68) February 21, 2019

What will it take to shame religious institutions into joining the national redress scheme for people who suffered institutional child sexual abuse?

Readers living in the Clarence Valley will notice that the Anglican Diocese of Grafton named as perpetrating abuse* by the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse has not yet joined the national compensation scheme which would allow victims who suffered at the hands of the diocese to seek full redress.

Readers further afield will notice that a large number of Protestant and Catholic institutions are dragging their feet with regard to this redress scheme.

Institutions That Are Not Yet Participating in the Redress Scheme For People Who Have Experienced Instituti... by clarencegirl on Scribd

https://www.scribd.com/document/400681740/Institutions-That-Are-Not-Yet-Participating-in-the-Redress-Scheme-For-People-Who-Have-Experienced-Institutional-Child-Sexual-Abuse

* This is the same Anglican Diocese of Grafton which Clarence Valley Council openly supports by inviting it to offer up a prayer of its choice at the beginning of council monthly meetings.

A reminder of just how far the mining industry will go to deny the lack of a social licence and undermine community opposition

ABC News, 19 February 2019:

Lawyers for mining firm Adani proposed waging "war" on opponents of its controversial Queensland mine by using the legal system to pressure government, silence critics and financially cripple activists, according to documents obtained by the ABC.

The draft copy of Adani's new law firm's aggressive strategy to bring the Carmichael mine to life is labelled "Taking the Gloves Off" and outlines a commercial proposal by AJ & Co to win a multi-million-dollar legal contract with the Indian mining giant.

In the document, the Brisbane firm promised to be Adani's "trained attack dog".

The strategy recommended bankrupting individuals who unsuccessfully challenge Adani in court, using lawsuits to pressure the Queensland Government and social media "bias" as a tool to discredit decisionmakers.

In a section called "Play the Man", it recommended "where activists and commentators spread untruths, use the legal system to silence them".

It also urged Adani to hire private investigators to target activists and work "with police and a criminal lawyer to ensure appropriate police action is taken against protesters".

"Like a well-trained police dog, our litigations know when to sit and shake, and when it is time to bite," the law firm promised.

"To achieve its commercial goal, Adani needs to accept it is involved in a war."

While Scott Morrison is trying to convince the electorate he now believes in climate change one of the denialists in his government is trying to erase it from school textbooks

There is Australian Prime Minister and Liberal MP for Cook since 2007 Scott Morrison fronting the media trying to convince sceptical voters that he and his government are now fully behind the need to tackle climate change.

However also talking to media is Liberal MP for Hughes since 2010 Craig Kelly doing his level best to undermine the current round political propaganda by calling for a rewrite of both climate science and history.

His climate change denying argument is far from unique.

Sometime around 1904 in far-off England a probably homesick second-generation Australian called Isobel Marion Dorothea Mackellar penned a six stanza poem called The Core Of My Heart aka My Country. This poem has been subverted by climate change deniers into a ‘proof’ that climate change is not real and is not happening right now.

Here Mr. Kelly citing all he can remember from the second stanza………

The Guardian, 26 February 2019:

The publisher of a NSW year-10 history book has rejected complaints from the federal Liberal backbencher Craig Kelly that it misrepresents facts about climate change.

Kelly took issue with the characterisation of climate change in the textbook Pearson History New South Wales.

Kelly has written to the NSW education minister, Rob Stokes, saying the book’s description of Tony Abbott as a climate change denier was “an offensive slur equating it with Holocaust deniers”, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The book says: “Climate change is noticeable in Australia, with more extreme frequent weather events such as the 2002-06 drought or the 2010-11 Queensland floods.”

“That is simply an inaccurate statement that is in a school history book,” Kelly told parliament’s federation chamber last week.

“What chance do we have of forming the best policies in this nation to deal with fire, floods and drought if we have children being misled by incorrect information in our history books?”

He quoted Dorothea Mackellar’s poem My Country to argue contemporary natural disasters are nothing out of the ordinary: “I love a sunburnt country, a land of sweeping plains, of ragged mountain ranges, of droughts and flooding rains,” the poem says.

“We need to understand that we live in that same country that Dorothea Mackellar wrote about over a hundred years ago,” Kelly said.

“That is why we need to prepare and help people recover from their resources instead of wasting money pretending that we can change the weather.”

The Australian Bureau of Meterology says “one of the greatest impacts of climate variability and climate change occurs through changes in the frequency and severity of extreme events.”

It describes the 2011 Brisbane floods as the second-highest flood level of the last 100 years, after January 1974.

The bureau and CSIRO’s latest State of the Climate report said Australia was experiencing more extreme heat, longer fire seasons, rising oceans and more marine heatwaves, consistent with a changing climate.......

Future of the Murray-Darling Basin: “It’s not a political football, it’s life we’re talking about!”

https://youtu.be/R9_H9JbbIjY