Undercover investigation reveals dodgy tactics and sparks search warrant

By Kieren McCarthy in San Francisco 19 Mar 2018  

Updated Controversial data analytics firm Cambridge Analytica has been hit with an emergency data seizure order in England following an extraordinary series of events Monday night that revolved around a TV undercover expose.
 
Following a day in which the company became the focus of attention online, in print, and in the UK Parliament and US Congress for its unethical use of user data, senior executives from the firm were then shown on camera boasting about the use of dark methods, including honey traps, fake news and sub-contracting with ex-spies to entrap individuals.
 
Full Article.

I nearly posted this article to the Forum last night, but it seemed (and seems) to be inaccurate in several respects, e.g. the claim that within one hour of the Channel 4 investigative programme finishing, the "authorities" "had received a warrant to search Cambridge Analytica's offices that very night" (Mon 19 Mar). Several apparent glaring inaccuracies such as this. Surprising that what I believed to be a reliable IT news organ appears to have got so many facts wrong. And at the time of my writing this, there has been no correction to the article. Shocking. Unless The Register is right and all the other news sources are wrong lol?*
 
Anyway, what is good is that they posted a YouTube version of the documentary.
 
*UPDATE: Elizabeth Denham UK Information Commissioner speaking on BBC News at 6 (Tue 20 Mar 18:00 UTC) a few minutes ago: "...so now I am moving ahead to seek a warrant so I can search premises and data."

I would guess that we will hear a lot more about what was going there in the next few days/weeks @

Absolutely! I kinda hope the denials by the Cambridge Analytica CEO prove to be true.
 
Let's hope we find out the truth anyway. The Information Commissioner and the wheels of justice are moving so slowly that one wonders whether, by the time they get in there, any evidence of crime (if there was any) will have been thoroughly cleaned up by the perpetrators.
 
"Honest Injun, we're innocent."

Well Cambridge Analytica have suspended its boss Alexander Nix now so you could say that things are a touch fluid right now 😉

@ wrote:
Well Cambridge Analytica have suspended its boss Alexander Nix now so you could say that things are a touch fluid right now ;)

“In the view of the board, Mr Nix’s recent comments secretly recorded by Channel 4 and other allegations do not represent the values or operations of the firm and his suspension reflects the seriousness with which we view this violation.”
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/mar/20/cambridge-analytica-suspends-ceo-alexander-nix
 
Obviously :D  (we'll see...)

Here is the second part of the UK Channel 4 investigative documentary, aired last night, showing how Cambridge Analytica executives and representatives claim, in these clandestinely recorded interviews, to have run the Trump 2016 Presidential Campaign:  

 
Very interesting and, if true, very troubling...
 
https://www.channel4.com/news/exposed-undercover-secrets-of-donald-trump-data-firm-cambridge-analytica

By Paul Wagenseil Mar 21, 2018
 
https://img.purch.com/zuckerberg-g8-shst.jpg/o/aHR0cDovL21lZGlhLmJlc3RvZm1pY3JvLmNvbS8yL1EvNzU4MjU4L29yaWdpbmFsL3p1Y2tlcmJlcmctZzgtc2hzdC5qcGc=
 
Since the scandal involving Facebook and the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica broke last Saturday (March 17), I've made a couple of media appearances and spoken to many friends and acquaintances about the issue.
 
Everyone has the same questions: How could Facebook let this data breach happen? Does this mean that other people have my Facebook data too?
 
There's only one answer to both questions: This is not a data breach, and other people do have your data, because collecting data on millions of users and then sharing that data with third parties is exactly how Facebook works.
 
"This is exactly Facebook's business model," Chester Wisniewski, a senior security analyst at Sophos, told Tom's Guide. "Except they want to be the ones doing the analytics and making all the money."
 
Full Article.
 
 

Here is a very interesting, and imho perceptive, analysis of the implications and the future probable fallout of the recent Facebook/Cambridge Analytica exposé:
 

"The evil genius of Cambridge Analytica was to exploit those we trust most

Richard WolffeWe trust our friends far more than any institution – a vulnerability Cambridge Analytica exploited via Facebook. But we won’t be so trusting again
@richardwolffedc Wed 21 Mar 2018 16.26 GMT Last modified on Wed 21 Mar 2018 20.11 GMT
  

Alexander Nix, the now suspended CEO of Cambridge Analytica. Photograph: Henry Nicholls/Reuters

How on earth did Donald Trump win the presidency when he lost the popular vote by such historic margins?
To put this in perspective: John Kerry lost the popular vote in 2004 by almost the same number of votes as Donald Trump 12 years later.This is not a small question, to be noodled over by disgruntled Democrats and political scientists. It lies at the heart of the likely impeachment of Trump himself, and it will dominate at least the next two US elections.
The answer is fundamental to our democratic culture of fair elections, the rule of law, the role of technology and the free media."
 
Full Article
 
And this all started with this article from the UK Sunday newspaper The Observer, sister newspaper to the UK daily The Guardian, that first started appearing on the internet last Saturday afternoon :S
 
Personally, I tend to agree with this journalist's analysis and predictions for the future.

More on Cambridge Analytica and—among other things—the UK Information Commissioner's continuing quest to gain a search warrant: https://www.channel4.com/news/more-facts-emerge-about-cambridge-analyticas-links-to-other-companies

 
 
 

                ***LATEST***
                  Cambridge Analytica search warrant granted and officers enter building:
 
 
 

"Cambridge Analytica: Enforcement Officers Enter London Office After Search Warrant Issued

UK's data watchdog finally granted legal authority for probe.

• By Jack Sommers

SOPA Images via Getty Images Enforcement officers working for the Information Commissioner have entered the premises of Cambridge Analytica in central London, after a High Court judge granted a search warrant.

The 18 officers went in on Friday evening after the judge granted the warrant following hours of legal argument and delays.The commissioner Elizabeth Denham first sought the warrant on Monday morning, as the firm was accused of harvesting millions of Facebook users’ data.

The sight of crates being removed from the Cambridge Anaylitica’s offices, all while the ICO’s warrant application was pending, prompted anger."
 
 
Full Article

Here is a fascinating video interview with Christopher Wylie, the Cambridge Analytica whistleblower, embedded in this Guardian article, where he analyses with surgical precision the evolution of Cambridge Analytica, from just an idea, into the monstrous micro-targetting propaganda machine, as some would perceive it, that it became; from a mere idea into Big Brother.

Fascinating indeed Muddy. Interesting to discover that Steve Bannon thought up the name of Cambridge Analytica!
 
I only have a modicum of sympathy though with Facebook users who are now calling foul. It seems to me that the majority of users give little or no thought to what FB may or may not do with the information that they openly spread all over the internet with their likes and "fascinating" pics of their latest meal our, new car, baby etc, etc.
 
Perhaps they think that FB is just there to help them get through their uneventful lives.

@
I was particularly tickled by Christopher Wylie's impersonation of Alexander Nix's oh! so British and oh! so slick sales pitch to billionaire Robert Mercer from 4:42 onwards. Vintage stuff!

April 4th 2018
 Facebook has said it now believes up to 87 million people's data was improperly shared with the political consultancy Cambridge Analytica.
 
The BBC has been told that about one million of them are UK-based.
 
The overall figure had been previously quoted as being 50 million by the whistleblower Christopher Wylie.
The details were revealed in a blog by the tech firm's chief technology officer, Mike Schroepfer.
 
Full Article - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-43649018#

Wow! That's incredible!
 
Well, at least FB appear to be making some effort to fess up and come clean.

@
 
A bit of reading for you if you have not seen it yet.
The Search and Account Recovery section is interesting.
 
An Update on Our Plans to Restrict Data Access on Facebook

Yes Jeff, I saw that link in your article above.*
 
But thanks anyway!
 
*Particularly: "Given the scale and sophistication of the activity we’ve seen, we believe most people on Facebook could have had their public profile scraped in this way." You couldn't make it up.

100 years from now, I predict that society will look back with incredulity and astonishment at the breathtaking naïvety of users of electronic devices and the internet of our epoch (and that unfortunately includes you and me to a greater or lesser extent :(), with regard to our almost unconditional trusting of our personal and private data to companies and organisations, and the brazen and cavalier attitude of many or even most of those companies and organisations as to what data they collected, how they collected it, and how they shared and protected that data—albeit often having neglected those duties, may I hasten to add, not out of sinister motives but out of laziness and/or inertia and/or constantly pushing the priority of these privacy concerns down their list due to the rat-race for economic survival in a highly competitive and often cut-throat environment.
 
I predict also that the European GDPR will be seen to have been the historic turning point in this worldwide act of collective folly.
 
Meanwhile, as privacy laws continue to get toughened up, I believe it is our sacred duty to be ever vigilant as users, and to hold all those to whom we have trusted our data up to accountability and transparency—transparency manifesting itself with clarity, limpidity and above all simplicity.