‘Ghost’ Facebook accounts

“All one needs to do is read-books, magazines, research the Internet - and pay attention to the influencers in their lives to discover the myriad people of strong moral character who have and still are making positive, meaningful contributions and differences in our world.”
—Zig Ziglar

By Alex P. Vidal

SINCE they don’t have the “profile pictures”, the so-called fake Facebook accounts that surfaced recently and sent a tidal wave of uproar among the Filipinos should be called as “ghost” accounts.
If Facebook has “accepted” its creation, a “fake” account becomes legitimate in any standard if allowed to function as a normal social media inhabitant.
Some owners of authentic Facebook accounts, by the way, don’t use profile pictures but their friends and relatives are very much aware of this from the very beginning, since they have been interacting using these profile picture-less accounts for a long time.
Also, there are authentic Facebook accounts that include the owners’ middle initials while most if not all of the ghost accounts created recently don’t have them.
Thus ghost Facebook accounts are useless.
Even if Facebook authorities won’t remove them, these bogus accounts won’t serve the purpose why they were created.
No normal person will lend his credence and accommodate these weird Facebook accounts.
The fact that they don’t have the profile pictures and most people with authentic Facebook accounts have already protested by warning they only maintain one account, these ghost accounts lose their credibility right away.
  
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Some of those alarmed and scandalized by the sudden mushrooming of ghost Facebook accounts have linked it to the ongoing debate on the anti-terrorism bill, which the proponents believe will soon be signed into law by President Rodrigo Roa Duterte. 
A progressive congressman feared these ghost accounts could be used as “tanim ebidensia” (planting of evidence) whatever it may have meant.
This can only be possible, I think, if the “planting of evidence” will be successfully placed on authentic accounts which appears to be implausible without the full cooperation of the owners.
Some of the so-called “trolls” are reportedly willing participants in inflammatory and digressive debates in the social media and most of them may be aware they’re doing this provocative roles in accordance to the wishes of certain political personalities.   
Interestingly, Facebook shut down hundreds of fake accounts, pages and groups that misled users, including some that used artificial intelligence to generate fake profile pictures mostly in the United States on December 20, 2019.
It's the first time researches who studied the group of account have seen AI-generated images used on such a large scale, raising concerns about how the social network will tackle this problem ahead of the November 2020 US presidential election. 

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The company also reportedly took down fake accounts from the photo-sharing service Instagram, which it owns. 
It pulled down 610 Facebook accounts, 89 pages, 156 groups and 72 Instagram accounts that were from the US and Vietnam. About 55 million accounts followed at least one of the pages and most of these followers were from outside the US, according to C/Net writers Queenie Wong and Corinne Reichert.
"We're constantly working to detect and stop this type of activity," Facebook said in a blog post. "We don't want our services to be used to manipulate people." 
The company said it removed the accounts for engaging in foreign and government interference or "coordinated inauthentic behavior," which means that whoever was running the accounts misled others about their identity and what they were doing. 
Targeting US citizens as well as Vietnamese, Spanish and Chinese-speaking audiences, the fake accounts "typically posted memes and other content about US political news and issues including impeachment, conservative ideology, political candidates, elections, trade, family values and freedom of religion," Facebook said. 
In other cases, fake accounts used photos from stock images or glamor shots found online. 
Another network of fake accounts reportedly originated from the country of Georgia. 
Facebook removed 39 Facebook accounts, 344 pages, 13 groups and 22 Instagram accounts, which collectively had more than 450,000 followers and members. 
The network pretended to be media, political parties and activists, posting about news, political issues and political criticism.
Twitter reportedly shared data of 5,929 accounts originating from Saudi Arabia that it removed for manipulating information.
"These accounts represent the core portion of a larger network of more than 88,000 accounts engaged in spammy behavior across a wide range of topics," Twitter said. "We have permanently suspended all of these accounts."
(The author, who is now based in New York City, used to be the editor of two local dailies in Iloilo)

Emily Lopez, first victim of gossip, fake news

“There is a fundamental difference between men and women - women need romance, men need intrigue.”
--Sherry Argov

By Alex P. Vidal

NEW YORK CITY -- The decision of former Guimaras Gov. Emily Relucio-Lopez to stay away from the kitchen when the heat became unbearable in 2006 was a brilliant move.
Her “premature” retirement from politics, as well, was mourned by her admirers, including some members of Iloilo media, but was hailed by friends who wanted to shield her from “dirty world of politics.”
Relucio-Lopez was supposed to get an ambassadorial post to Italy under the Arroyo administration, but merchants of intrigues and gossipers made sure she would be sideswiped from selection process.
As soon as her name surfaced as among those being considered by then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo for the post, green-eyed monsters started to circulate ugly stories about her relationship with husband, former Iloilo second district Rep. Albertito Lopez.
Her detractors tried to flood the mass media with fake news (it’s good social media wasn’t so influential at that time) that Chona Mejia, Rep. Lopez’s estranged wife, was sharpening her knife and was poised to appear in the Commission on Appointments (CA) to “spell the beans” and oppose the former governor’s appointment.
It was actually Sen. Sergio “Serge” Osmeña III who was painting the town red portraying Relucio-Lopez to be “unworthy” of the ambassadorial position.

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Osmeña had ax to grind against Relucio-Lopez because his wife, Betina, was Chona Mejia’s daughter with Rep. Lopez.
According to Osmeña, the marriage between Chona and Rep. Lopez has never been annulled and there was no divorce in the Philippines.
When reached by reporters for comment, Chona Mejia reportedly denied she was planning a CA ambush against Relucio-Lopez.
She admitted though she tried to campaign against Relucio-Lopez when the latter ran for office in Guimaras in the 90’s.
Chona Mejia, too, appeared to have let bygones be bygones and wasn’t interested anymore to dip her fingers into the murky waters of politics.
True or not, Osmeña’s saber rattling was dismissed by Relucio-Lopez’s sympathizers as an “intriga” (intrigue) and a “tsismis” (gossip).
It was also belittled as an “estoppel” since Relucio-Lopez had also previously served as congresswoman in Guimaras aside from governor in the island province; her relationship with Rep. Lopez was never used with extreme necessity by her political enemies to stymie her stint as public servant.
It was tsismis or gossip that toppled Relucio-Lopez from the ambassadorial post to Italy.

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We remember Gov. Relucio-Lopez’s predicament amid the decision of Facebook to lower the boom on fake news websites in the Philippines that contain false information.
The lady governor would have been a victim of cyber or internet bullying if social media was active during her time.
An outstanding public servant, Relucio-Lopez was a big loss in Philippine politics.
The idea of building a bridge between Guimaras and Iloilo had been conceptualized during her term as governor.
She refused to seek reelection for congresswoman at the time when Guimaras was starting to attract foreign investors and when “delicious” Guimaras mango became an international sensation.