Thousands of posts around January 6 riots go missing from Facebook transparency tool

[aggiesal]

Source: politico.eu

The social media company said it was a technical error, and has been fixed, but tens of thousands of posts are still missing.



Scores of Facebook posts from the days before and after the January 6 Capitol Hill riots in Washington are missing.

The posts disappeared from Crowdtangle, a tool owned by Facebook that allows researchers to track what people are saying on the platform, according to academics from New York University and Université Grenoble Alpes.

The lost posts — everything from innocuous personal updates to potential incitement to violence to mainstream news articles — have been unavailable within Facebook's transparency system since at least May, 2021. The company told POLITICO that they were accidentally removed from Crowdtangle because of a limit on how Facebook allows data to be accessed via its technical transparency tools. It said that the error had now been fixed.

Facebook did not address the sizeable gap in its Crowdtangle data publicly until contacted by POLITICO, despite ongoing pressure from policymakers about the company's role in helping spread messages, posts and videos about the violent insurrection, which killed five people. On Friday, U.S. lawmakers ordered the company to hand over reams of internal documents and data linked to the riots, including details on how misinformation, which targeted the U.S. presidential election, had spread.

It is unclear how many posts are still missing from Crowdtangle, when they will be restored, and if the problem solely affects U.S. content or material from all of Facebook's 2.4 billion users worldwide. The academics who discovered the problem estimate that tens of thousands of Facebook posts are currently missing.

Read more: https://www.politico.eu/article/facebook-crowdtangle-data-january-6-capitol-hill-riots-transparency/

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Kevin McCarthy threatens social media and suddenly thousand's of Facebook posts are missing.

I'm I missing something here?

[Miguelito Loveless]

1. Facebook now obstructing justice

And endorsing insurrection.

[Qutzupalotl]

4. Bingo.

[OldBaldy1701E]

23. Double Bingo! (n/t)

[NurseJackie]

31. No it's not.

[Miguelito Loveless]

32. If they are "accidentally"

removing evidence of criminal activity, that's obstruction. Whether it is prosecutable depends on how good they were at plausible deniability. Facebook has made it plain where their sympathies lie. Fascism sells.

[NurseJackie]

34. These are ridiculous unfounded accusations that serve no good purpose...

... and in the end, it only weakens legitimate criticism of Facebook. Even if THIRTY THOUSAND uploads/posts were lost or missing... it's such a small number that it's statistically insignificant.

See this: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10142794143#post28

Only 0.008571428571% of one day's posts missing.

Politico is a joke.

[Botany]

2. Theresa Hong 2016 Trump Campaign digital manager, "Without Facebook we wouldn't have won," she said

Link to tweet

[Skittles]

8. it kills me how many people were sucked into the FB Borg

ugh

[Botany]

11. And thanx to Cambridge Analytica, Russia, Fox News, Cozy Bear, unending and unneeded, ...

... GOP led hearings into Hillary and her emails, and along with "the liberal" media (see the NY Times)
"they" were able to bath millions of Americans in misinformation which kept the election much closer
than it should have been so Russia could rat fuck the elections and install Trump to help to destroy America
from with in.

[BigmanPigman]

14. Bingo!

[Botany]

27. and that Russian, right wing, GOP, and QAnon along with assorted racist nutball groups are now ...

... using Facebook to spread misinformation about the c-19 virus, masks, and vaccines.

[PortTack]

13. Very frustrating isn't it??!!

[Skittles]

18. I knew people were easily manipulated

but.....yeah, it is frustrating indeed

[turbinetree]

3. accidentally removed... BULLSHIT.....sounds like fucking gaslighting.....I really do hate Facebook

it has been and always will be about greed....

[MontanaMama]

5. Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg are complicit

in the insurrection attempt on the United States of America. Keep using it to connect with friends and family. Good grief. 🤦‍♀️

[OldBaldy1701E]

24. If I hear that excuse one more time

Why is it when I point out the weak-egoed, self-absorbed mentality that requires something like Facebook that I get that phrase. One might think that was the only reason the program existed. One would be so very wrong. I don't blame tools for people's evil stupidity like some people. People will just find another tool to use. We need to start addressing the underlying reasons for what is going on. Namely, that people are allowed to be stupid and in some cases have legal protection to do so. How is that possible?

[HUAJIAO]

26. I use FB daily for legitimate purposes, much of it business.

Are you telling me I have a "weak-egoed, self-absorbed mentality?" OR am I misunderstanding your meaning?

[OldBaldy1701E]

39. I was not speaking of uses in business

Nowadays, businesses have little choice but to go along with the current fad to stay 'up to date' and viable. Bear in mind, I was referring to the phrase: 'I just use it to stay in touch with family and to find people I lost over the years.' And no, you did not misunderstand my meaning. You assumed I was referring to you. Interesting.

[HUAJIAO]

40. Glad to hear it's not me.

Before I retired I used FB extensively for business.

Now I also use it for occasional business (buying and selling and discussing used/vintage musical instruments) and to stay in touch with events, happenings, concerts, personnel, etc in the percussion/classical music world... since many/most of the people I contact with are scattered throughout the world from Singapore to Seoul, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Nerlin, Macao, Oslo, Muscat, etc.. In fact most of my friends are somehow or other involved in the arts.. so I guess I use it some for friends also.

I'm fortunate that I never see posts about or by right wing anything (as far as I know.. LOL).. How lucky I am, I am sure.

[ancianita]

6. Has Zuckerberg obstructed this investigation? Has he become an accessory after the fact?

[NurseJackie]

30. No.

Has Zuckerberg obstructed this investigation? Has he become an accessory after the fact?

No. That's ridiculous.

[AllaN01Bear]

7. tech error my eye . sounds delibrate to me from that fat slob who owns the company.

[NH Ethylene]

16. The man who owns the company is fat?

Wow, that certainly was an illuminating detail to include.

[dobleremolque]

9. Looks like Nixon's secretary, Rose Mary Woods,

and Zuckerberg could form a club with an exclusive 2 person membership.

For you whipper-snappers, Rose Mary Woods was Richard Nixon's secretary who famously (or infamously) took the fall for an 18-second gap that mysteriously appeared in the White House tape recordings, before they were turned over to the Congressional committee that investigated Watergate.

[LastLiberal in PalmSprings]

10. So, tens of thousands of FB posts around Jan 6 are missing when Congress wants them?

[PortTack]

12. FB is part of the fascist problem we are facing in this country. Please consider not using the site

[BigmanPigman]

15. Never have and never will.

Fuckerberg is a fascist. My family was just disgussing this tonight in fact.

[Rhiannon12866]

17. After Cambridge Analytica, I'm surprised it's still functioning

But I guess those who continue to use it don't follow the news - or they're still using it for nefarious purposes.

[NurseJackie]

29. You do you. I'll continue to enjoy Facebook, TYVM.

[C Moon]

19. I wouldn't be surprised if someone has a backup of them, and FB isn't aware of it.

[FakeNoose]

37. Don't worry, the FBI has everything safely archived

[Hekate]

21. What a coinkydink! It's not just amazing, but amazing AF!

[KS Toronado]

22. Can we get a Grand Jury to order the FBI to seize all of their computers?

So that computer data recovery experts can find out what was erased? Plus if we find out Zuchabitch was/is
lying to help reQublicOn insurrectionists or congressmen, well he made his bed & can go lie in it.

[oldsoftie]

25. And Trumpers blame FB for Biden's win!

[NurseJackie]

28. Big whoop. Considering that 243,055 new photos are uploaded to Facebook every minute...

... it is entirely believable that there could be a data or database error that causes a small fraction to go "missing". In a day's time there are just under 350 million uploads to Facebook. So... if "tens of thousands" (let's say 30-thousand) "went missing" that's a small fraction of the ones that remain.

Only 0.008571428571% are missing.
The remaining 99.991428571429% are just fine.

Don't believe me? Calculate it yourself.

Good grief! This is ridiculous. Politico is getting upset over nothing.


https://blog.wishpond.com/post/115675435109/40-up-to-date-facebook-facts-and-stats (with sources and footnotes)

[aggiesal]

33. Yes, but these are concentrated around Jan 6th. ...

which makes it highly suspicious.

[NurseJackie]

35. No it doesn't.

Is January 6th an anomaly? Or is it fairly typical? Politico is jumping to anti-Facebook paranoid conclusions (without evidence or proof) that make themselves look ridiculous. They're a joke.

[DallasNE]

36. This Doesn't Pass The Smell Test

Any IT shop knows that the first thing you do before running an update process is to perform a full file backup of all files to have changes applied. That pretty much eliminates this being an accidental purge of records.

[aggiesal]

38. You would think ...

I worked for a company where we were moving relay racks with priority equipment in the racks.
To me, the risk was too high to move the equipment without backing them up.
I instructed my team to back up the system before we started moving the equipment.
My team complained to my supervisor and my decision was over turned.

We moved the racks and you can guess what happened.
Yup, we lost the system. The company was down for over 2 weeks until we could load the
previous backups, losing the changes made since. I mean literally, we could not do anything
for 2 weeks, because it was the priority equipment.

I left the company soon after that.
This company is not some fly-by-night company.
It is a highly respected company where their products are easily recognized throughout the world.
I believe my supervisor was forced to leave or got fired, after I left, because I ran into him at
a local restaurant, and he was now working for another company.
The company closed its local offices less than a year later.