NYT Reporter and author of NYT Bestseller AN UGLY TRUTH, with
@ceciliakang
. Raising two kids and a cat in Oakland. Tell me a story: sheera.frenkel
@nytimes
.com
Was just on phone with someone who works for FB who described employees unable to enter buildings this morning to begin to evaluate extent of outage because their badges weren’t working to access doors.
Just had the lovely experience of listening to my 4-year-old tell another kid what I do for work. "My mom talks to people and then she writes down their stories, but they have to be real, not pretend. There are no mermaids."
Just to recap: after initially calling our story inaccurate, (and internally calling it “false”), Facebook has now confirmed most, if not all of our reporting. They just waited until eve of Thanksgiving when they thought as few as possible people would be reading.
"Did we ask them to do work on George Soros? Yes." Facebook took responsibility for hiring a lobbying company that pushed negative stories about Facebook’s critics.
SCOOP with
@MikeIsaac
, Facebook employees are staging a walkout today for the first time in the company's history. They are protesting the decision by Zuckerberg to allow Trump's post to stand:
In case anyone is wondering, online these far right movements are claiming victory. Even if they were quickly evacuated by police, the photographs of them freely roaming the halls of Congress are powerful optics they will use to recruit thousands to their cause.
Here’s a story about what it took for me to appear on MSNBC this morning for five minutes to talk about my front-page story in the NYT. Or: Why it is so hard for working moms to have it all. (Thread)
If you want to delete Facebook, go ahead. Just know that's a privilege.
For much of the world, Facebook is the internet and only way to connect to family/friend/business. That's why its important to have a real discussion re Facebook's security/privacy issues.
This story has been 6 months in the making. It started with a question: What happened inside Facebook over the last 3 years, and what did top executives, Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg, do in the wake of crisis after crisis battering the company?
Thank you to the Facebook engineer who just sent me this message. (Shared with permission). "The blight that is QAnon is going to be on our hands forever. I am going to be apologizing to my kids for enabling these a**holes."
Nothing like this has ever happened at Facebook. Employees always voiced dissent internally. Today's walkout is a sign that anger is spilling over, and that employees don't feel heard by Zuckerberg/Sandberg
Already this morning, some FB engineers have publicly quit. Many more are considering it.
Zuckerberg is about to address FB, but there isn't much hope among employees that he will reverse course and take action against Trump's post. "He isn't built that way," one employee said
Honestly, going to scream if one more cable pundit says they could not see this coming.
PHONE LITERALLY ANY REPORTER COVERING QANON/FAR RIGHT MOVEMENTS.
This is
@clarissaward
confronting one of the FSB operatives implicated in the attempted murder of
@navalny
. What a badass moment of awesome journalism.
It happened. Today I got an email from a PR company offering a man as a subject matter expert… on the book I wrote with
@ceciliakang
.
Please, my dude, explain my book to me…
And here is the segment. Also, for those DMing me, yes I have a (great) husband. But he's out of town and even if he wasn't, heads to work every day at 7AM.
Huh. Just had my third conversation in two days with an employee at FB who admires the position Twitter has taken, and is disappointed in Zuckerberg's response. Wonder if this will come up at the all-hands meeting today.
We can write a thousand articles about how vaccines are effective in stopping the severity of Covid, and crucial towards curbing the pandemic for us all, but one tweet like this will be held up by millions who are trying to put off getting vaccinated.
They want you to get vaccinated for the Met. if I get vaccinated it won’t for the Met. It’ll be once I feel I’ve done enough research. I’m working on that now. In the meantime my loves, be safe. Wear the mask with 2 strings that grips your head & face. Not that loose one 🙏♥️
A thought I keep having is that it’s BS that states opened up restaurants/bars/etc before they figured out how to open schools. It tell us everything we need to know about how this country constantly makes it as hard as possible to have kids and be a working parent.
Journalists who follow the far-right, pro-Trump movement have been warning for weeks that January 6 had real potential for violence. Unbelievable that more wasn't done to secure the Capitol building ahed of these protests.
Facebook's head of the DC office, Joel Kaplan, and Kavanaugh are personal friends. That's why Kaplan is at the hearing. No one at Facebook knew he was going, and no one is happy that he is sitting front and center behind Kavanaugh.
TikTok teens and K-pop stans are declaring victory tonight for a prank to register fake tickets at Trump's Tulsa rally. Collab with
@TaylorLorenz
and
@Kellen_Browning
I’m not blaming the TV studios. They have slots to fill and the day’s news is often unpredictable. But this is just one example of how the system isn’t set up for moms, and why doing it all, at work and at home, is often a shitshow.
PRETTY PLEASE: If you are a journalists/researcher jumping into reporting on the far-right this month, please follow the best practices of those who have been doing it for years. DO NOT post direct links or screen shots which show the name of the Telegram channel/Gab group/etc
I just bought a multi-pack of at-home Covid antigen tests I spotted as a Black Friday deal.
This moment encapsulates everything that is wrong with this year, the American healthcare system, and Black Friday.
Already, people inside Facebook are asking why Zuckerberg made this call when similar bans have not taken place in countries around the world where political leaders have used their platform to inflame and inspire mobs and protests.
They are also asking why this took so long.
Hate speech, homophobia, and anti-Semitism are all increasing on Twitter since Elon Musk took over. That’s what the most comprehensive data to-date is telling researchers, who say the worst may be yet to come. Story with
@kateconger
I arrive in studio, and I get a miracle parking spot. (Pt
#3
) There is no makeup person, and even if there was, the makeup is all made for caucasians. The camerawoman sees my panic and buys me 2 minutes to slap on some of my own makeup. (Bless you camerawoman).
I woke up at 5AM to my 1-year-old melting down in her crib. When I got up to put her back to sleep, I saw 6 missed calls on my phone. A few TV networks were asking if I could come on air. Happenstance
#1
- Had the kiddo not woken up, I would have never see these messages in time.
And I’m on! It’s a story about Russia and the midterms, two subjects I know a lot about. I’ve written about them extensively, for the NYT and others. But because I’m a mom to a (young) kiddo, I often have to watch (male) colleagues go on to discuss my work.
Every group chat among my friends right now is discussing whose parents/grandparents got vaccinated and how. Everyone whose parents got a shot did so through their kids/grandkids repeatedly refreshing websites and ringing hotlines until they got a spot.
What a broken system.
Wow, if only there was a huge, public event today where all the celebrities were gathered under one roof, and someone could ask them their opinion on the Supreme Court potentially overturning Roe vs. Wade.
#MetGala2022
Just now on a call with reporters, Facebook refused to give direct answers to the following:
-Have they already found efforts to disrupt midterms on FB?
-Will they tell us which pages are being downranked for spreading disinfo on FB?
- Does downranking a page actually work?
To be clear: We spoke to seven current and former Facebook employees for this story on how internal disputes over FB's role in spreading disinformation lead to the departure of Alex Stamos.
My toddler this morning:
Her: “Mama, make me dippy eggs.”
Me: “ok, I thought your dad already made you eggs?”
Her: “off a record, yours are better.”
So yeah, work from home is going great.
All of these parents had no negative views on vaccines before the pandemic. Now they are against all vaccine mandates, including ones they already got for their kids. Many spoke of losing all faith in the medical establishment.
Zuckerberg just did a call to discuss FB response to coronavirus. He said that to fight misinformation, FB is making sure ppl see info from trusted news outlets and orgs first.
Soo... Facebook just realized answer to fighting misinfo was to promote the news industry?
I won't go on about this anymore because honestly, I've had a fun and relaxing weekend with my family, but opening my messages today it is insane how many referenced 6MWE. (6 million wasn't enough).
I've seen it before but now feels different. When did it become this widespread?
Most of the requests needed me in a TV studio by 6-7AM, which is pretty impossible for most working moms, unless they can afford live-in or round-the-clock help. Most daycares and nannies start between 8-9. So immediately, the morning shows were out.
Looking at the label Facebook just put on Trump’s misleading post about voting. Nothing about this label tells me that what Trump said is wrong. It actually looks like Facebook is building off Trump’s post and sending users somewhere to register to vote.
How is this helping?
I was lucky, my mom was in town and could swing over on short notice. I told the networks I could make a show by 8:30, but it would need to be a studio near my house. Pt
#2
- Had my mom not been in town, and a trooper, i probably wouldn’t have been able to do any of the shows.
NEWS - Facebook has just announced its most sweeping action against QAnon to-date. The company has just removed 790 groups, and imposed restrictions on another 1,950.
Facebook's sweeping ban on QAnon today is important. QAnon uses militaristic language about itself and its followers because it sees itself as waging a war. The most fertile ground for its goal (new recruits) has been Facebook and Instagram.
Zuckerberg's announcement today has done little to stem the growing ad boycott against Facebook. Just hours after
@MikeIsaac
and I published this story, one of the biggest brands in the world, Coca-Cola, announced it was joining the boycott:
I am joining more than 1,100 of my colleagues at the NYT on strike tomorrow.
Among national, business, and metro reporters, more than 90% of the desk is joining the strike.
None of us wanted it to come to this, but two years is too long to wait for a fair contract.
@facebook
But like our story laid out,
@facebook
’s strategy had been to delay, deny, and deflect. It appears you are doing exactly that in your response to our reporting.
Me, to the 3-year-old: Very soon there might be a woman as Vice President. It’s the first time this country will have a woman Vice President!
Her: Why?
Me: Because the vote is very close and it looks like she might win!
Her: No, Why is she the first?
Joseph Mercola just announced that he is removing all his blogs from his website. We profiled him last week, as the WH and others have cited a report which names as a top spreader of Covid misinformation.
So now it is 7:30. Baby is nursed and dressed. Grandma is in place, and I’ve even managed to brush my teeth! MSNBC calls and tells me the studio is farther away then I thought, and my slot has been moved up from 8:30 to 8. I’m breaking the speed limit to get there.
East Bay folks- there are families from Afghanistan already arriving here.
Check with your local orgs, including JFCS and IRC if you want to donate/help.
Can we just stop with the hot takes on the Beirut explosion? Most of you have no idea how to analyze an explosion and the few people who do are busy working right now.
"He was a winner, until he was a loser."
@ariehkovler
summarizes how the Proud Boys, and other far-right groups, turned on Trump the moment he left office.
@MikeIsaac
Facebook employees organized this virtual walkout over the weekend. Employee taking part have taken the day off, and are posting in FB's internal systems that they stand in solidarity with the protest.
Alex Jones had come back into the Senate Intel committee after confronting Rubio in the hallway. Can hear him speaking into his camera as he films behind me.
@facebook
We have already addressed this. Your post listing “inaccuracies” points to things we never wrote in our story. Ie, you write that Stamos and the security team were never stopped from investigating Russia. Our story never said they were.
A new viral Covid misinformation video is doing crazy numbers on Facebook.
In the 5 hrs since it posted it's racked up 13 million views and over 100K comments. It's currently one of the most-watched videos on FB, and it shows a group of doctors disputing the seriousness of Covid
Basically, we all got very lucky that whoever was behind the Twitter hack today was not a very good criminal. They had control of Twitter accounts for some of the world’s most powerful public figures, and used it to make... roughly $300,000?
I interviewed 27 parents across the US who adopted anti-vaccine positions during the pandemic, and heard strikingly similar stories of feeling left behind by the government and finding their way to online rabbit holes.
It’s almost like every step Apple and other companies take to put more privacy options in the hands of users affects Facebook’s ability to make billions off of people’s private information?
Facebook says apps using its advertising network could see revenue drop 50 percent, now that iOS 14 will require users to opt in to sharing their device info.
Excited to reveal the full cover of our book for the first time! We took a different direction for the blurbs. Please support
@ceciliakang
and I be pre-ordering!
Now, the parents have become one issue voters ahead of the midterms. Republicans and Democrats who once voted on party line are now seeking out candidates who promise no vaccine mandates of any kind.
So today I attended my first zoom funeral.
I know we are all figuring out this new world of digital connections but I can already tell you that there is a reason we gather together with our communities to bury our loved ones.
Just want to note: we asked for interviews with Zuckerberg and Sandberg for months before our story published. We asked for them again after we had read them into all the details we were going to publish. They never choose to speak to us.
If your timeline feels like a bunch of Californians complaining about the smoke and heat and (earthquake?) today it’s because the full weight of the climate apocalypse we brought on ourselves feels especially real and frightening today.
Things that have happened this week:
1) The NYT broke the story about Trump’s $750 taxes.
2) The norm-breaking presidential debate.
3) The president announcing he and the First Lady have Covid.
If you told me a month had passed since item
#1
I would have believed you.
No company has ever before been in such a position at the intersection of technology, politics, security and society. To report this story we interviewed more than 50 people. Most of what they told us has never been reported before.
We did a no surprises call with Facebook before the story was published. It’s a basic (good) journalistic practice in which you let a company or person know a story is coming, and give them a chance to respond.... Facebook only fired Definers after the story came out.
Q: how come you don’t know everything that was in the NYT story? A: I published a 4,500 word essay on our content-moderation policies so “I am very clearly involved in all the details” but can’t know everything going on here.
Elon Musk just joined a Twitter spaces dedicated to reporters being banned/suspended from Twitter (by the inimitable
@katienotopoulos
) but left just as journalists started to question his logic (namely, that the banned accounts weren’t sharing links to real-time location data)
Tucker Carlson just went on Fox and claimed that 30% of voting machines in Maricopa, Arizona, didn't work (not accurate, it was printers) and that election officials didn't let people vote (not accurate). Story here on what actually happened:
Following our reporting on this, Instagram has removed the hashtag
#jewsdid911
. It was active for years and had over 11,000 posts. It was one of the top search results if you searched for “Jews.” Why did it take our questions to get it removed?
Hearing from Facebook sources that the company is blaming the release of our book, An Ugly Truth, for WH officials being fired up on Covid misinfo. Would love to take credit, but the truth is that the WH is looking at the facts and data on the role FB plays in spreading misinfo.
Facebook just removed the post from
@realDonaldTrump
comparing Covid to the flu. Nearly 300,000 people liked the post in the hours before it was removed.
This is the second time they have removed a post from his Facebook page, (which they say is actually run by his campaign).
Women everywhere are listening to Christine Blasey Ford's voice cracking and feeling their own hearts break, just a little bit more, at the world we’ve all inherited.