[Buzzfeed] The same week Mark Zuckerberg delivered his live video remarks about Russian election interference on Facebook, he picked up the phone and called Rep. Adam Schiff, the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee.
At one point during the nearly 30 minute conversation, Schiff asked why Facebook took so long to find the $100,000 in ads a Kremlin-linked entity bought in an effort to disrupt the 2016 US Presidential election and its aftermath. Zuckerberg’s answer apparently did not fully satisfy, and Schiff told BuzzFeed News he plans to follow up.
The Russian ad scandal has captured lawmakers' attention in a way Facebook’s previous political crises ‐ from allegations of bias in its Trending column to its role in spreading fake news ‐ have not. It has crystallized a trio of individual fears ‐ Facebook is too big, has too much influence, and cannot effectively monitor itself ‐ into one big expression of all of them.
And now, with Congress scrutinizing it and the world watching, Facebook is scrambling to contain an metastasizing crisis that has tarnished its public image and conjured the threat of possible government regulation. In November, the House Intelligence Committee, of which Schiff is a key part, plans to hold an open hearing to discuss Russian election interference. And Schiff would very much like to see Facebook there. "We have an interest in having them come into our committee," he said. |