Facebook profits rise amid revelations from leaked documents
Menlo Park (AP): Amid fallout from the Facebook Papers documents supporting claims that the social network has valued financial success over user safety, Facebook on Monday reported higher profit for the latest quarter.
The company's latest show of financial strength followed an avalanche of reports on the Facebook Papers a vast trove of redacted internal documents obtained by a consortium of news organisations, including The Associated Press as well as Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen's Monday testimony to British lawmakers.
Facebook said its net income grew 17 per cent in the July-September period to USD 9.19 billion, buoyed by strong advertising revenue.
That's up from USD 7.85 billion a year earlier. Revenue grew 35 per cent to USD 29.01 billion. The results exceeded analyst expectations for Facebook's results.
The company's shares rose 2.5 per cent in after-hours trading after closing up 1 per cent for the day.
For now, the revenue picture for Facebook looks as good as can be expected, said eMarketer analyst Debra Aho Williamson. But she predicted more revelations and described the findings so far as unsettling and stomach-churning.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg made only a brief mention of what he called the recent debate around our company."
Largely repeating statements he made after Haugen's October 5 testimony before a US Senate subcommittee, he insisted that he welcomes good faith criticism but considers the current storm a coordinated effort by news organisations to criticise the company based on leaked documents.
Haugen, meanwhile, told a British parliamentary committee Monday that the social media giant stokes online hate and extremism, fails to protect children from harmful content and lacks any incentive to fix the problems, providing momentum for efforts by European governments working on stricter regulation of tech companies.
While her testimony echoed much of what she told the US Senate this month, her in-person appearance drew intense interest from a British parliamentary committee that is much further along in drawing up legislation to rein in the power of social media companies.
Haugen told the committee of United Kingdom lawmakers that Facebook Groups amplifies online hate, saying algorithms that prioritize engagement take people with mainstream interests and push them to the extremes.
The former Facebook data scientist said the company could add moderators to prevent groups over a certain size from being used to spread extremist views.
Unquestionably, it's making hate worse, she said.
Haugen said she was shocked to hear recently that Facebook wants to double down on the metaverse and that they're gonna hire 10,000 engineers in Europe to work on the metaverse, Haugen said, referring to the company's plans for an immersive online world it believes will be the next big internet trend.
I was like, Wow, do you know what we could have done with safety if we had 10,000 more engineers?' she said.
Facebook says it wants regulation for tech companies and was glad the UK was leading the way.
While we have rules against harmful content and publish regular transparency reports, we agree we need regulation for the whole industry so that businesses like ours aren't making these decisions on our own," Facebook said Monday.
It pointed to investing USD 13 billion (9.4 billion pounds) on safety and security since 2016 and asserted that it's almost halved the amount of hate speech over the last three quarters.
Haugen accused Facebook-owned Instagram of failing to keep children under 13 the minimum user age from opening accounts, saying it wasn't doing enough to protect kids from content that, for example, makes them feel bad about their bodies.
Facebook's own research describes it as an addict's narrative. Kids say, This makes me unhappy, I feel like I don't have the ability to control my usage of it, and I feel like if I left, I'd be ostracised, she said.
The company last month delayed plans for a kids' version of Instagram, geared toward those under 13, to address concerns about the vulnerability of younger users.
Haugen said she worried it may not be possible to make Instagram safe for a 14-year-old and that I sincerely doubt it's possible to make it safe for a 10-year-old.
She also said Facebook's moderation systems are worse at catching content in languages other than English, and that's a problem even in the UK because it's a diverse country.
Those people are also living in the UK and being fed misinformation that is dangerous, that radicalizes people, Haugen said.
And so language-based coverage is not just a good-for-individuals thing, it's a national security issue.
Pressed on whether she believes Facebook is fundamentally evil, Haugen demurred and said, I can't see into the hearts of men. Facebook is not evil, but negligent, she suggested.
It believes in a world of flatness, and it won't accept the consequences of its actions, pointing to its mammoth one-level, open-plan corporate office as an embodiment of the philosophy.
It was Haugen's second appearance before lawmakers after she testified in the US about the danger she says the company poses, from harming children to inciting political violence and fueling misinformation. Haugen cited internal research documents she secretly copied before leaving her job in Facebook's civic integrity unit.
The documents, which Haugen provided to the US Securities and Exchange Commission, allege Facebook prioritised profits over safety and hid its own research from investors and the public.
Some stories based on the files have already been published, exposing internal turmoil after Facebook was blindsided by the January 6 US Capitol riot and how it dithered over curbing divisive content in India. More is to come.
Representatives from Facebook and other social media companies plan to speak to the British committee Thursday.
UK lawmakers are drafting an online safety bill calling for setting up a regulator that would hold companies to account when it comes to removing harmful or illegal content from their platforms, such as terrorist material or child sex abuse images.
Haugen is scheduled to meet next month with European Union officials in Brussels, where the bloc's executive commission is updating its digital rulebook to better protect internet users by holding online companies more responsible for illegal or dangerous content.
Under the UK rules, expected to take effect next year, Silicon Valley giants face an ultimate penalty of up to 10 per cent of their global revenue for any violations. The EU is proposing a similar penalty.
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Congress not just removed clothes at AI Summit but exposed its intellectual bankruptcy: PM Modi
New Delhi (PTI): Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday came down heavily on the Congress for the shirtless protest by its youth wing members at the AI Impact Summit recently, saying the opposition party can tear as many clothes as it wants, but his government will continue to work for the country's progress.
Addressing the News18 Rising Bharat Summit, Modi also said that the Congress did not just remove its clothes in front of foreign guests but also exposed its intellectual bankruptcy, asserting that the millennials have already taught the country's oldest party a lesson, and now Gen-Z is ready to do the same.
In an apparent jibe at Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Modi said the opposition was unhappy seeing the statue of "Babbar Shers" (lions) installed atop the new Parliament building, but their own “Babbar Shers" were running away after facing the "shoes" of the general public.
Gandhi, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, had said on February 24 that he was proud of the "Babbar Shers" of the Indian Youth Congress, who "fearlessly" raised their voice at the AI Summit.
"Congress ke Babbar Sher logon ki jute kha ke bhaag gaye (The 'lions' of Congress ran away after being hit by shoes by the public)," Modi said.
The prime minister was apparently referring to the protesting Youth Congress workers being heckled by some people at the AI Summit.
On February 20, a group of Indian Youth Congress (IYC) workers staged a dramatic protest inside Hall No. 5 of the summit venue in Delhi by removing their shirts to reveal T-shirts printed with anti-government slogans, triggering a political slugfest between the BJP and the Congress.
“Congress can tear as many clothes as it wants, but we will continue to work for India's development. Congress not just shed clothes at the AI Summit, it also exposed its incapabilities in front of foreign guests,” Modi said in his nearly 45-minute speech.
He said the AI Summit was a moment of pride for the entire nation, but unfortunately, Congress attempted to tarnish this national celebration.
"When the frustration and despair of failure weigh on the mind, and arrogance makes one's head spin, such a mindset emerges to defame the country," he said.
The prime minister also alleged that the Congress always takes refuge in Mahatma Gandhi to hide its failures, but tries to give credit to one family for anything good.
"People of our country welcomed every good step taken by our government, but the Congress only knows how to oppose everything. The votes of Congress are not stolen; rather, people do not consider Congress worthy of their votes. Millennials first taught a lesson to Congress, now Gen-Z is ready to do the same," he said.
Modi also said that in a democracy, the role of the opposition is not just about blindly opposing every move of the government, but presenting an alternative vision, and that is why the "enlightened public" of the country is "teaching a lesson" to Congress now.
In 1984, the Congress got 39 per cent of the votes and more than 400 seats. But its votes declined consistently in the subsequent elections, Modi said.
"Today, the condition of the Congress is such that it has more than 50 MLAs in just four states. Over the past 40 years, the number of young voters in the country has increased, but the Congress has clearly diminished," Modi said.
On the recent trade deals that India signed with foreign countries, Modi said the country has discovered its inherent strength and strengthened its institutions, which prompted developed nations to come forward and sign deals with India.
He also said that even after Independence, some people ensured that the colonial mindset remained for their own benefits.
"No country would have done trade deals with us had we not discovered our inherent strength and strengthened our institutions. Because of this, developed nations have come forward to sign trade deals (with India)," he said.
Modi also said that even after Independence, India was unable to break free from the mentality of slavery, for which the country is still paying the price.
"The latest example of this can be seen in the ongoing discussions on trade deals. Some people are shocked – ‘what has happened, how did this happen? Why are developed countries so eager to do trade deals with India?’ The answer is – a confident India is emerging from despair and frustration," he said.
Over the long span of history, centuries of slavery had instilled a feeling of inferiority, while the ideology imported from other countries deeply ingrained in society the notion that Indians were uneducated and subservient, the prime minister said.
"If the country was still mired in the despair of the pre-2014 era, counted among the 'Fragile Five', and gripped by policy paralysis, who would strike a trade deal with us?
"Over the past 11 years, a new surge of energy has flowed into the nation's consciousness. India is now striving to reclaim its lost potential," Modi said.
The prime minister also said that due to the recent series of reforms initiated by his government, the world's most powerful nations are now coming forward to sign trade deals with India.
"There was a time when India was only a consumer of new technology. But now we are not just developing them, but also setting standards," he said.
The prime minister also said that India's digital public infrastructure has become a subject of global discussion today, and every move India makes is closely watched and analysed across the world.
"The AI Summit was a clear example of this," he said.
The government's 'Viksit Bharat by 2047' is not a political slogan but an effort to correct the mistakes of the previous Congress governments by making India self-reliant, he said.
“So far, in every industrial revolution, India and the Global South largely remained followers, but in this age of artificial intelligence (AI), India is not only participating but is also shaping it. India now has its own AI startup ecosystem,” Modi said.
He also said the world is astonished that India, where around 30 million families lived in darkness until 2014, has now risen to become one of the top countries in solar power capacity.
India, where many cities had no hope of improving their public transport system, has now become the country with the world's third-largest Metro network, Modi said.
“The Indian Railways was known only for chronic delays and sluggish speeds, yet semi-high-speed connectivity like Vande Bharat and Namo Bharat has now become possible,” he said.
Nation-building never happens through short-term thinking; it is shaped by a long-term vision, patience and timely decisions, the prime minister added.
