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The Honeymoon is Over in Silicon Valley

posted by martyb on Wednesday December 06 2017, @05:13PM   
from the thorny-questions dept.

Phoenix666 writes:

The bloom is off the rose:

It was about an hour and a half into a hearing with the Senate Intelligence Committee when Sen. Dianne Feinstein laid into Facebook, Google and Twitter.

"I don't think you get it," she began. "You bear this responsibility. You've created these platforms, and now they are being misused. And you have to be the ones to do something about it. Or we will."

The tech giants were being grilled by Congress over Russian trolls abusing their services to meddle in last year's US election, and the California Democratic lawmaker had had it.

It was just one of very public tongue-lashings the Silicon Valley companies received over the course of three marathon congressional panels last month, held over a two-day span. The hearings were anticlimactic, in part because the three companies only sent their general counsels instead of their famous CEOs -- a point several lawmakers bemoaned during the public questioning.

Is it Google, Twitter, and Facebook who don't get it, or Senators like Dianne Feinstein who don't get it?

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Original Submission

• If the trolls weren't violating PAC rules, If the trolls weren't violating PAC rules, (Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 06 2017, @10:22PM (1 child)

  by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 06 2017, @10:22PM (#606445)

  and were operating under 501-(c)3,4 of the tax code, they weren't breaking any laws.

  If Congress wants to constrain foreign influence over domestic elections, they might start by (as an example) requiring that corporations disclose ALL foreign stock holders and employees before making campaign contributions.

  Of course if they did that, they'd be disclosing that every person in the Congress has taken money from foreign sources. And they're fully aware of this, and fully aware of how to fix it. But they'd rather drop a flaming bag of shit on the first amendment, so that they can say "look aren't we wonderful", while still taking backhanders from every two bit dictator and bottle washer on the planet.

  Oh they get it all right. In twenties and fifties.

  Starting Score:	0		points
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  Interesting=1, Touché=1, Total=2
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• Re:If the trolls weren't violating PAC rules, (Score: 2, Informative) by Aegis on Wednesday December 06 2017, @11:52PM

  by Aegis (6714) on Wednesday December 06 2017, @11:52PM (#606478)

  ...and were operating under 501-(c)3,4 of the tax code, they weren't breaking any laws.

  501-(c)3 explicitly forbids political activity. [irs.gov]

  ...in addition, it may not be an action organization, i.e., it may not attempt to influence legislation as a substantial part of its activities and it may not participate in any campaign activity for or against political candidates.

  Parent