Hid Efforts to Hook Users Ex-Insider Says Facebook
1
U(D54G1D)y+[!#!@!$!# WASHINGTON — A former Facebook product manager who turned into a whistle-blower gave lawmakers an unvarnished look into the inner workings of the world’s largest social network on Tuesday and detailed how the company was deliberate in its ef- forts to keep people — including children — hooked to its service. In more than three hours of tes- timony before a Senate subcom- mittee, Frances Haugen, who worked on Facebook’s civic misin- formation team for nearly two years until May, spoke candidly and with a level of insight that the company’s executives have rarely provided. She said Facebook had purposely hidden disturbing re- search about how teenagers felt worse about themselves after us- ing its products and how it was willing to use hateful content on its site to keep users coming back. Ms. Haugen also gave lawmak- ers information on what other data they should ask Facebook for, which could then lead to proposals to regulate the Silicon Valley giant as it increasingly faces questions about its global reach and power. “I’m here today because I be- lieve Facebook’s products harm children, stoke division and weak- en our democracy,” Ms. Haugen, 37, said during her testimony. “The company’s leadership knows how to make Facebook and Instagram safer but won’t make the necessary changes.” After years of congressional hearings on Facebook and other large tech companies, Ms. Hau- gen’s appearance stood out not only for the inside look but for the way she united Republican and Democratic lawmakers around tackling the issue of the platform’s harm to teenagers. Some senators called her testimony a “Big Tobac- co” moment for the technology in- dustry. The lawmakers said Ms. Hau- gen’s testimony, and the thou- sands of pages of documents she had gathered from the company and then leaked, showed that Facebook’s top executives had misled the public and could not be trusted. “This research is the definition of a bombshell,” said Senator Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, who led the hearing. Ms. Haugen’s testimony to the Senate Commerce subcommittee on consumer protection capped several intense weeks of scrutiny for Facebook after she leaked thousands of pages of internal documents to The Wall Street Journal. The newspaper’s cover- age last month set off one of Face- book’s worst public relations cri- ses since a data privacy scandal in 2018 with the consulting firm Cambridge Analytica. On Sunday, Ms. Haugen’s iden- tity as the whistle-blower became public when she set up a personal website and appeared on “60 Min- utes.” Facebook has repeatedly pushed back on the criticism, say- ing its research was taken out of context and misunderstood. Late Tuesday evening, Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive, Ex-Insider Says Facebook Hid Efforts to Hook Users Senate Panel Is Told How Platforms Profit From Spread of Harmful Content By CECILIA KANG Frances Haugen leaked thou- sands of pages of documents. T.J. KIRKPATRICK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Continued on Page A22 WASHINGTON — Top Ameri- can counterintelligence officials warned every C.I.A. station and base around the world last week about troubling numbers of in- formants recruited from other countries to spy for the United States being captured or killed, people familiar with the matter said. The message, in an unusual top secret cable, said that the C.I.A.’s counterintelligence mission cen- ter had looked at dozens of cases in the last several years involving foreign informants who had been killed, arrested or most likely compromised. Although brief, the cable laid out the specific number of agents executed by rival intelli- gence agencies — a closely held detail that counterintelligence of- ficials typically do not share in such cables. The cable highlighted the strug- gle the spy agency is having as it works to recruit spies around the world in difficult operating envi- ronments. In recent years, adver- sarial intelligence services in countries such as Russia, China, Iran and Pakistan have been hunt- ing down the C.I.A.’s sources and in some cases turning them into double agents. Acknowledging that recruiting spies is a high-risk business, the cable raised issues that have C.I.A. Issues Alert on Risks To Informants By JULIAN E. BARNES and ADAM GOLDMAN Continued on Page A6 In the chaos of the American military withdrawal and the Tal- iban takeover this summer, thou- sands of American-made weap- ons and tons of military equip- ment were seized by the militants as government military bases sur- rendered or were overrun. With the Taliban in power, more American weapons and military accessories are now being openly sold in shops by Afghan gun deal- ers who paid government soldiers and Taliban fighters for guns, am- munition and other matériel, ac- cording to weapons dealers in Kandahar Province in southern Afghanistan. In interviews, three weapons dealers in Kandahar said that doz- ens of Afghans have set up weap- ons shops in Afghanistan’s south, selling American-made pistols, ri- fles, grenades, binoculars and night-vision goggles. The equip- ment was originally provided to the Afghan security forces under a U.S. training and assistance pro- gram that cost American taxpay- ers more than $83 billion through two decades of war. During the insurgency, the Tal- iban eagerly sought out Ameri- can-supplied weapons and gear. But now much of that weaponry is being sold to Afghan en- trepreneurs because Taliban de- mand has eased with the end of Now for Sale In Afghanistan: American Guns By RUHULLAH KHAPALWAK and DAVID ZUCCHINO Continued on Page A6 Chinese tech companies are reeling from regulation. Nervous creditors are hoping for a bailout for China’s largest developer. Growing numbers of executives are going to jail. An entire indus- try is shutting down. For China’s leader, Xi Jinping, it’s all part of the plan. Under Mr. Xi, China is reshap- ing how business works and lim- iting executives’ power. Long in coming, but rapid in execution, the policies are driven by a desire for state control and self-reliance as well as concerns about debt, in- equality and influence by foreign countries, including the United States. Emboldened by swelling na- tionalism and his success with Covid-19, Mr. Xi is remaking Chi- na’s business world in his own im- age. Above all else, that means control. Where once executives had a green light to grow at any cost, officials now want to dictate which industries boom, which ones bust and how it happens. The changes offer a glimpse of Mr. Xi’s vision for managing the economy, ahead of a political meeting ex- pected to solidify his plans for an unprecedented third term. The goal is to fix structural problems, like excess debt and in- equality, and generate more bal- anced growth. The measures mark the end of a Gilded Age for An Emboldened Xi Remakes China’s Business World in His Image By PAUL MOZUR Tightening Rules and Jailing Executives Continued on Page A8 DANIELE VOLPE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES Migrants ousted from a church in a Mexico border city found shelter across the street. Page A4. Pastor Shuts Doors; Brother Opens His WASHINGTON — President Biden and Democratic leaders in Congress in recent days have slashed their ambitions for a ma- jor expansion of America’s social safety net to a package worth $2.3 trillion or less, which will force hard choices about how to scale back a proposal that the president hopes will be transfor- mational. The figure is substantially less than Mr. Biden’s earlier plan, which called for $3.5 trillion in new spending and tax cuts to spur a generational expansion of gov- ernment in Americans’ lives, in- cluding efforts to fight climate change and child poverty, in- crease access to education and help American companies com- pete with China. Democratic leaders will proba- bly need to narrow their plans for free community college, child tax credits and universal prekinder- garten so they are offered only to lower- and middle-income Ameri- cans, according to party members involved in the negotiations. The White House is also debat- ing whether to try to keep as many programs as possible, by cutting their duration or reach, or to jetti- son some initiatives entirely to keep others largely intact, accord- ing to people familiar with the dis- cussions. The cuts represent a blow to Mr. Biden’s agenda, but the remaining plans would still deliver signifi- cant benefits to a wide range of Americans. Mr. Biden and his aides have known for months that they would most likely need to reduce the size and scope of his plans to satisfy moderates in his party. But the Tough Choices As Biden Tries To Shrink Plan By JIM TANKERSLEY and EMILY COCHRANE Continued on Page A16 WASHINGTON — In March 2006, as the government veered dangerously close to a default, Senator Mitch McConnell, the No. 2 Republican, let the Bush White House know he was two votes short of what he needed to raise the legal limit on federal bor- rowing. Andrew H. Card Jr., then the White House chief of staff, began working the phones. He soon found two Democrats willing to break ranks and vote to put the legislation over the top. But instead of thanking him, the Senate leader grew irate. Mr. Mc- Connell had been hoping to ex- tract concessions from President George W. Bush as the price for uniting Republicans around lifting the limit. “I don’t need your damned votes,” he snapped at Mr. Card. He lifted the debt ceiling with Repub- licans only. Mr. Card never learned what the Kentucky Republican wanted, but he tells the story for a reason: Mr. McConnell has long used the periodic need to raise the govern- ment’s borrowing limit as a moment of leverage to secure a policy win, as have leaders of both parties. But two weeks before a poten- tially catastrophic default, Mr. Mc- Connell, now the minority leader, has yet to reveal what he wants, telling President Biden in a letter on Monday, “We have no list of de- mands.” Instead, he appears to want to sow political chaos for Democrats while insulating himself and other Republicans from an issue that has the potential to divide them. Mr. McConnell has said the gov- ernment must not be allowed to stop paying its debts; he has also said he will not let any Republi- cans vote to raise the debt limit, while moving to block Democrats from doing so themselves. He plans to do so again on McConnell Offers No Votes and No Demands By JONATHAN WEISMAN As U.S. Nears a Debt Crisis, Republicans Let the Clock Tick Continued on Page A16 The rapper, who’s awaiting trial on gun charges, has tallied billions of streams and four chart-topping albums despite almost no mainstream profile. PAGE C1 ARTS C1-8 YoungBoy’s Surprising Success The Yankees fell to Boston in a one-game playoff, a format some love, some hate and one that may soon go away. PAGE B7 SPORTS B7-9, 12 After 162 Games, One Chance The Afghanistan war’s ending without a single soldier listed as missing reflects a shift in military priorities. PAGE A13 NATIONAL A13-19, 22 An American First: No M.I.A.s Inspired by video games, movies and television shows like “Star Trek” and “Game of Thrones,” writers are creating cookbooks and new recipes with play- ers and viewers in mind. PAGE D1 FOOD D1-8 Fan Fiction, but for Food A commission set up at the request of the Roman Catholic Church in France found the problem was more wide- spread than had been thought. PAGE A9 INTERNATIONAL A4-12 Over 200,000 Minors Abused A reliance on exports has left Europe’s largest economy especially vulnerable to shortages of key materials. PAGE B1 BUSINESS B1-6 Supply Crisis Tests Germany A new charter school in the Bronx has an unusual focus: career paths revolv- ing around basketball. PAGE B9 Schooled on the Court A Russian film crew arrived at the International Space Station, aiming to shoot a feature film in orbit. PAGE A10 Zero-G on the Set The head of the N.Y.P.D.’s Sergeants Benevolent Association was also said to have been targeted. PAGE A19 F.B.I. Raids a Police Union Lauren Williams PAGE A21 OPINION A20-21 A new House map proposed by Texas Republicans aims to lock in the party’s advantage in Washington. Pages A14-15. How Texas Plans to Make Its House Districts Even Redder Dallas Dallas Fort Worth Fort Worth Dallas Dallas Fort Worth Fort Worth Houston Houston Houston Houston Austin Austin San Antonio El Paso Austin Austin El Paso proposed districts for this decade current congressional districts 38 36 San Antonio Sources: U.S. Census Bureau; Texas Legislative Council ELLA KOEZE, DENISE LU AND BILL MARSH/THE NEW YORK TIMES Most Democratic (Biden +10 or more) More competitive (less than 10-pt. margin) Most Republican (Trump +10 or more) 9 14 13 12 3 23 CURRENT DISTRICTS 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION MARGINS PROPOSED DISTRICTS Alan Kalter, 78, was far more than the “Late Show” announcer: He took part in zany stunts for 20 years. PAGE B11 OBITUARIES B10-11 The Voice of Letterman’s Show Late Edition VOL. CLXXI . . . No. 59,203 © 2021 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2021 Today, cloudy at first, partial clear- ing later, a little milder, high 72. To- night, partly cloudy, low 62. Tomor- row, periodic clouds and sunshine, high 74. Weather map, Page B12. $3.00
Transcript of Hid Efforts to Hook Users Ex-Insider Says Facebook
C M Y K Nxxx,2021-10-06,A,001,Bs-4C,E2
U(D54G1D)y+[!#!@!$!#
WASHINGTON — A formerFacebook product manager whoturned into a whistle-blower gavelawmakers an unvarnished lookinto the inner workings of theworld’s largest social network onTuesday and detailed how thecompany was deliberate in its ef-forts to keep people — includingchildren — hooked to its service.
In more than three hours of tes-timony before a Senate subcom-mittee, Frances Haugen, whoworked on Facebook’s civic misin-formation team for nearly twoyears until May, spoke candidlyand with a level of insight that thecompany’s executives have rarelyprovided. She said Facebook hadpurposely hidden disturbing re-search about how teenagers feltworse about themselves after us-ing its products and how it waswilling to use hateful content onits site to keep users coming back.
Ms. Haugen also gave lawmak-ers information on what otherdata they should ask Facebook for,which could then lead to proposalsto regulate the Silicon Valley giantas it increasingly faces questionsabout its global reach and power.
“I’m here today because I be-lieve Facebook’s products harmchildren, stoke division and weak-en our democracy,” Ms. Haugen,37, said during her testimony.“The company’s leadershipknows how to make Facebook andInstagram safer but won’t makethe necessary changes.”
After years of congressionalhearings on Facebook and otherlarge tech companies, Ms. Hau-gen’s appearance stood out notonly for the inside look but for theway she united Republican andDemocratic lawmakers aroundtackling the issue of the platform’sharm to teenagers. Some senatorscalled her testimony a “Big Tobac-co” moment for the technology in-dustry.
The lawmakers said Ms. Hau-gen’s testimony, and the thou-
sands of pages of documents shehad gathered from the companyand then leaked, showed thatFacebook’s top executives hadmisled the public and could not betrusted.
“This research is the definitionof a bombshell,” said SenatorRichard Blumenthal, Democrat ofConnecticut, who led the hearing.
Ms. Haugen’s testimony to theSenate Commerce subcommitteeon consumer protection cappedseveral intense weeks of scrutinyfor Facebook after she leakedthousands of pages of internal
documents to The Wall StreetJournal. The newspaper’s cover-age last month set off one of Face-book’s worst public relations cri-ses since a data privacy scandal in2018 with the consulting firmCambridge Analytica.
On Sunday, Ms. Haugen’s iden-tity as the whistle-blower becamepublic when she set up a personalwebsite and appeared on “60 Min-utes.”
Facebook has repeatedlypushed back on the criticism, say-ing its research was taken out ofcontext and misunderstood.
Late Tuesday evening, MarkZuckerberg, the chief executive,
Ex-Insider Says FacebookHid Efforts to Hook Users
Senate Panel Is Told How Platforms ProfitFrom Spread of Harmful Content
By CECILIA KANG
Frances Haugen leaked thou-sands of pages of documents.
T.J. KIRKPATRICK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Continued on Page A22
WASHINGTON — Top Ameri-can counterintelligence officialswarned every C.I.A. station andbase around the world last weekabout troubling numbers of in-formants recruited from othercountries to spy for the UnitedStates being captured or killed,people familiar with the mattersaid.
The message, in an unusual topsecret cable, said that the C.I.A.’scounterintelligence mission cen-ter had looked at dozens of casesin the last several years involvingforeign informants who had beenkilled, arrested or most likelycompromised. Although brief, thecable laid out the specific numberof agents executed by rival intelli-gence agencies — a closely helddetail that counterintelligence of-ficials typically do not share insuch cables.
The cable highlighted the strug-gle the spy agency is having as itworks to recruit spies around theworld in difficult operating envi-ronments. In recent years, adver-sarial intelligence services incountries such as Russia, China,Iran and Pakistan have been hunt-ing down the C.I.A.’s sources andin some cases turning them intodouble agents.
Acknowledging that recruitingspies is a high-risk business, thecable raised issues that have
C.I.A. IssuesAlert on Risks
To InformantsBy JULIAN E. BARNESand ADAM GOLDMAN
Continued on Page A6
In the chaos of the Americanmilitary withdrawal and the Tal-iban takeover this summer, thou-sands of American-made weap-ons and tons of military equip-ment were seized by the militantsas government military bases sur-rendered or were overrun.
With the Taliban in power, moreAmerican weapons and militaryaccessories are now being openlysold in shops by Afghan gun deal-ers who paid government soldiersand Taliban fighters for guns, am-munition and other matériel, ac-cording to weapons dealers inKandahar Province in southernAfghanistan.
In interviews, three weaponsdealers in Kandahar said that doz-ens of Afghans have set up weap-ons shops in Afghanistan’s south,selling American-made pistols, ri-fles, grenades, binoculars andnight-vision goggles. The equip-ment was originally provided tothe Afghan security forces undera U.S. training and assistance pro-gram that cost American taxpay-ers more than $83 billion throughtwo decades of war.
During the insurgency, the Tal-iban eagerly sought out Ameri-can-supplied weapons and gear.But now much of that weaponry isbeing sold to Afghan en-trepreneurs because Taliban de-mand has eased with the end of
Now for SaleIn Afghanistan:American GunsBy RUHULLAH KHAPALWAK
and DAVID ZUCCHINO
Continued on Page A6
Chinese tech companies arereeling from regulation. Nervouscreditors are hoping for a bailoutfor China’s largest developer.Growing numbers of executivesare going to jail. An entire indus-try is shutting down.
For China’s leader, Xi Jinping,it’s all part of the plan.
Under Mr. Xi, China is reshap-
ing how business works and lim-iting executives’ power. Long incoming, but rapid in execution,the policies are driven by a desirefor state control and self-relianceas well as concerns about debt, in-equality and influence by foreigncountries, including the UnitedStates.
Emboldened by swelling na-tionalism and his success withCovid-19, Mr. Xi is remaking Chi-
na’s business world in his own im-age. Above all else, that meanscontrol. Where once executiveshad a green light to grow at anycost, officials now want to dictatewhich industries boom, which
ones bust and how it happens. Thechanges offer a glimpse of Mr. Xi’svision for managing the economy,ahead of a political meeting ex-pected to solidify his plans for anunprecedented third term.
The goal is to fix structuralproblems, like excess debt and in-equality, and generate more bal-anced growth. The measuresmark the end of a Gilded Age for
An Emboldened Xi Remakes China’s Business World in His ImageBy PAUL MOZUR Tightening Rules and
Jailing Executives
Continued on Page A8
DANIELE VOLPE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES
Migrants ousted from a church in a Mexico border city found shelter across the street. Page A4.Pastor Shuts Doors; Brother Opens His
WASHINGTON — PresidentBiden and Democratic leaders inCongress in recent days haveslashed their ambitions for a ma-jor expansion of America’s socialsafety net to a package worth$2.3 trillion or less, which willforce hard choices about how toscale back a proposal that thepresident hopes will be transfor-mational.
The figure is substantially lessthan Mr. Biden’s earlier plan,which called for $3.5 trillion innew spending and tax cuts to spura generational expansion of gov-ernment in Americans’ lives, in-cluding efforts to fight climatechange and child poverty, in-crease access to education andhelp American companies com-pete with China.
Democratic leaders will proba-bly need to narrow their plans forfree community college, child taxcredits and universal prekinder-garten so they are offered only tolower- and middle-income Ameri-cans, according to party membersinvolved in the negotiations.
The White House is also debat-ing whether to try to keep as manyprograms as possible, by cuttingtheir duration or reach, or to jetti-son some initiatives entirely tokeep others largely intact, accord-ing to people familiar with the dis-cussions.
The cuts represent a blow to Mr.Biden’s agenda, but the remainingplans would still deliver signifi-cant benefits to a wide range ofAmericans.
Mr. Biden and his aides haveknown for months that they wouldmost likely need to reduce the sizeand scope of his plans to satisfymoderates in his party. But the
Tough ChoicesAs Biden Tries To Shrink Plan
By JIM TANKERSLEYand EMILY COCHRANE
Continued on Page A16
WASHINGTON — In March2006, as the government veereddangerously close to a default,Senator Mitch McConnell, theNo. 2 Republican, let the BushWhite House know he was twovotes short of what he needed toraise the legal limit on federal bor-rowing.
Andrew H. Card Jr., then theWhite House chief of staff, beganworking the phones. He soonfound two Democrats willing tobreak ranks and vote to put thelegislation over the top.
But instead of thanking him, theSenate leader grew irate. Mr. Mc-Connell had been hoping to ex-tract concessions from PresidentGeorge W. Bush as the price for
uniting Republicans around liftingthe limit.
“I don’t need your damnedvotes,” he snapped at Mr. Card. Helifted the debt ceiling with Repub-licans only.
Mr. Card never learned whatthe Kentucky Republican wanted,but he tells the story for a reason:Mr. McConnell has long used theperiodic need to raise the govern-ment’s borrowing limit as amoment of leverage to secure apolicy win, as have leaders of
both parties.But two weeks before a poten-
tially catastrophic default, Mr. Mc-Connell, now the minority leader,has yet to reveal what he wants,telling President Biden in a letteron Monday, “We have no list of de-mands.”
Instead, he appears to want tosow political chaos for Democratswhile insulating himself and otherRepublicans from an issue thathas the potential to divide them.
Mr. McConnell has said the gov-ernment must not be allowed tostop paying its debts; he has alsosaid he will not let any Republi-cans vote to raise the debt limit,while moving to block Democratsfrom doing so themselves.
He plans to do so again on
McConnell Offers No Votes and No Demands
By JONATHAN WEISMAN As U.S. Nears a DebtCrisis, RepublicansLet the Clock Tick
Continued on Page A16
The rapper, who’s awaiting trial on guncharges, has tallied billions of streamsand four chart-topping albums despitealmost no mainstream profile. PAGE C1
ARTS C1-8
YoungBoy’s Surprising SuccessThe Yankees fell to Boston in a one-gameplayoff, a format some love, some hateand one that may soon go away. PAGE B7
SPORTS B7-9, 12
After 162 Games, One ChanceThe Afghanistan war’s ending without asingle soldier listed as missing reflectsa shift in military priorities. PAGE A13
NATIONAL A13-19, 22
An American First: No M.I.A.s
Inspired by video games, movies andtelevision shows like “Star Trek” and“Game of Thrones,” writers are creatingcookbooks and new recipes with play-ers and viewers in mind. PAGE D1
FOOD D1-8
Fan Fiction, but for FoodA commission set up at the request ofthe Roman Catholic Church in Francefound the problem was more wide-spread than had been thought. PAGE A9
INTERNATIONAL A4-12
Over 200,000 Minors Abused
A reliance on exports has left Europe’slargest economy especially vulnerableto shortages of key materials. PAGE B1
BUSINESS B1-6
Supply Crisis Tests GermanyA new charter school in the Bronx hasan unusual focus: career paths revolv-ing around basketball. PAGE B9
Schooled on the Court
A Russian film crew arrived at theInternational Space Station, aiming toshoot a feature film in orbit. PAGE A10
Zero-G on the Set
The head of the N.Y.P.D.’s SergeantsBenevolent Association was also said tohave been targeted. PAGE A19
F.B.I. Raids a Police Union
Lauren Williams PAGE A21
OPINION A20-21
A new House map proposed by Texas Republicans aims to lock in the party’s advantage in Washington. Pages A14-15.
How Texas Plans to Make Its House Districts Even Redder
DallasDallasFort WorthFort Worth DallasDallasFort WorthFort Worth
HoustonHouston HoustonHouston
AustinAustin
San Antonio
El Paso
AustinAustin
El Paso
proposed districts for this decade
current congressional districts
3836
San Antonio
Sources: U.S. Census Bureau; Texas Legislative Council ELLA KOEZE, DENISE LU AND BILL MARSH/THE NEW YORK TIMES
Most Democratic (Biden +10 or more)
More competitive (less than 10-pt. margin)
Most Republican (Trump +10 or more)
9
14
13
12
3
23
CURRENT DISTRICTS2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION MARGINS PROPOSED DISTRICTS
Alan Kalter, 78, was far more than the“Late Show” announcer: He took partin zany stunts for 20 years. PAGE B11
OBITUARIES B10-11
The Voice of Letterman’s Show
Late Edition
VOL. CLXXI . . . No. 59,203 © 2021 The New York Times Company NEW YORK, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2021
Today, cloudy at first, partial clear-ing later, a little milder, high 72. To-night, partly cloudy, low 62. Tomor-row, periodic clouds and sunshine,high 74. Weather map, Page B12.
$3.00
