What Facebook, Google and Twitter Told Congress About Russian Misinformation

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Congress on Jan 25 published responses from Facebook, Twitter, and Google to questions about how Russian actors used their platforms to spread misinformation before and after the 2016 U.S. presidential election. The responses address issues including whether there is any evidence of collusion between the Russian parties and the Trump campaign, and how Google, a unit of Alphabet, is handling its commercial transactions with a Russian broadcaster that federal intelligence agencies say is a propaganda outlet for the Kremlin. The responses, which were submitted to Congress in recent weeks, are an extension of answers that executives from the three companies gave in hours of testimony in 2017.

Facebook gave different responses to questions from two lawmakers about whether there was evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russian-backed actors. In one set of answers, the company said it found “what appears to be insignificant overlap” between the ad-targeting criteria and content used by the IRA and that used by the Trump campaign. In another set of responses, Facebook said it can’t “substantiate or disprove allegations of possible collusion.” Facebook also said that it had no evidence that the IRA used U.S. voter registration data to target ads on the platform.


What Facebook, Google and Twitter Told Congress About Russian Misinformation