And then it welcome our witnesses in the Senior Vice President of council at google the media has been fixated on the platforms from spreading misinformation during the 2016 election. This was an opportunity for each of you to tell your respective stories of necessary correct the record. My sense is not all aspects of those stories have been told accurately but i will go for the record of this committee now is having the 17th open hearing and the 12th of which we will be discussing russias activities. Im hopeful we can provide an informed an incredible credible assessment how you use your platforms during last years elections. I am also hopeful you will share what your companies are doing to make it harder for foreign actors future platforms automated accounts to falsify stories here in the United States. The National Security shows the unacceptable risk to have a responsibility to reduce that vulnerability. While on the topic of responsibility and will push back on some narratives sprung up around this subject a lot of folks including those in the media reduce the entire conversation to one promise of four actors of a colbert operation to help the United States president ion here to tell you does not simplify that easily. It is shortsighted and dangerous to focus on one piece of information to think that tells whole story. We have heard a series of russian linked spate facebook adds during the leave up to the president ial election and some of those targeted specific bid groups but it was a pivotal state to influence the election outcome. What you have not heard is almost five times more ads were targeted in the state of maryland and wisconsin. 262 as compared to wisconsins 55. Maryland was not up for grabs the Democratic Candidates carried by 26 percent. But for those 35 out of 55 targeted at wisconsin those rand prior to the wisconsin primary before the identified the republican candidate and not one of those mentioned and donald trump. Would the key legislative pennsylvania had fewer advertisements in washington d. C. Were 87 percent of the electorate voted Hillary Clinton. For the three most heavily targeted states in america were determined by the merger won by Hillary Clinton more of these geographically targeted ads ran in 2015 and 2016 before trump was identified as a candidate. So that revolves more than 100,000 worth of ads on the hot bush and hot button issues. So to add some detail with the meetings failed to put the 100,000 into a frame of reference the toll had spent was 190,079 all the 54 spent before the primary before the emergence of a republican candidate. In the state of michigan was a hundred 23, pa. 300. So to believe that narrative to except these factors to assess which is critical to the election then invested all of 300 to execute their plan 300. What and five times as much money spent on advertising in california with a state that has not voted republican in president ial. [null] since 1988 even with the benefit of members what can be calculated and measured it is incredibly complex we cannot get the amount of money spent and ads purchased and the divisive content that they directed people in the number of tweets and manipulated search results above the intends of the operation will we cannot do is calculate the impact that foreign meddling in social media had on this election nor can we assume that it must be the explanation for the outcome that many did not expect. I understand the urge to make the storys simple to make complex sort manageable and interpret things in ways that conform to your conclusions but pointing to a state to say no ads ran there after the election does not prove intent or motive it just shows that no ads ran after the election. The subject is complicated there is whole new vocabulary that comes with this. Impressions are different but there is one thing i am certain and it is this given the complexity of what we have seen if anyone tells you they have this all figured out they are kidding themselves. We cannot afford to kick ourselves what happened last year and continues to happen today. That is why we depend on insight and information 60 percent of the population with a foreign power using that platform is as much a Public Policy issue than National Security concern crafting the elegant policy solution it is reflected not not overly burdensome so just recently on the basis of a sophisticated analysis the original estimate of 10 million americans exposed to russian content on facebook was increased at 126 million that tells me your companys are just beginning to come to grips with the scale and death of the problem. That is encouraging but no this, we do better when you do a better writer do to keep that in mind and work with us proactiveproactive ly to find the right solution to a complete challenge i will take a moment to stress this hearing wedded is and is not about. This is not about real litigating the 2016 president ial election. It is not about to move won or lost the National Security and Corporate Responsibility and the derivative than multifaceted manipulation of the American People by agents of of of style foreign power. Again, agents of ross style foreign power use our own social media platforms to conduct the Information Operation intended to divide our society with issues like race and immigration and Second Amendment rights. But to tears apart the use social media platforms that americans invented in connection with the First Amendment freedoms that define the open and democratic society. It is a shock to see the use that network with communications mediums and so essential to our lives today to interfere with a core of our democracy, what is more troubling is the likelihood that these platforms are still used to spread lies and promote conflict in drive americans apart per your three companies have developed platforms the tremendous reach and influence. That has been unable to for what the information you collect on your users and their activities now the americans need to know how to use the information and what youre doing to protect them your actions need to catch up to your responsibilities. Level lot to get to i will stop period thanks to the Witnesses Today and it turned to the vicechairman for any comments. Let me also express thoughts about the tragedy yesterday in new york but you are right, in the age of social media we cannot afford to waste that much time to get the point across. So straight to the bottom line, russian operatives are attempting to infiltrate and manipulate americas social media to hijack the National Conversation and to make americans angry. Setting us against ourselves with the most basic to undermine our democracy during the 2016 president ial campaign and they are still doing it now. And now one of us is doing enough to stop it and that is why we do it today so in many ways the threat to is not new russians are conducting Information Warfare but what is new is the advent of social media tools with the power to magnify propaganda on a scale unimaginable so todays tools seed purpose filled so it works like this this Information Agent set up thousands of fake accounts and groups across a wide array of platforms and these fake accounts populate content on facebook and instagram, twitter, u2, and many other platforms. Each of these accounts literally spent months to develop networks of real people to follow and like their content like the paid ads or the automated bots no idea never caught up in the webs in these are pushing misinformation with state led propaganda and fake news. In the goal is simple to get this so called news into the news feed of many receptive americans and to push those americans into the direction of the kremlin somebody deeply respects that industry here in the industry for more than 20 years negative still learning the nature of the threat and even i struggle with the difference between fake accounts and how they generate like san tweets and shares and all of these actions are defined by the ecosystem but what is clear however is the play book offers a tremendous bang for the buck. To what the chinese data and trolls and fake accounts and bots to drive traffic and targeted the audience to force propaganda into the mainstream to be catholic with the online discourse. If you look back at the results pretty good retirement investment so where to go from here . To use the Platform Companies of United States government and the American People to deal with this new in devolving threat social media with those tools he should have developed to transform from shopping from a tertiaries to close Small Businesses but with russias actions are further exposing the ecosystem you have created and there is no doubt the Successful Campaign will be replicated from the nation states that wish to do harm around the world this is not unique american phenomenon. They need to commit more resources to identify those that actors to prevent them from abusing the social media ecosystem. Thanks in part each has uncovered some of the evidence of the ways the russians exploited the platform during the 2016 election. Much of the attention has been focused on those paid ads that dave targeted americans however it is the tip of a large iceberg in the real story is the amount of misinformation and divisive content pushed for free on the russian backed accounts that were spread to tens of millions of americans 120 russian back pages built a network of 3. 3 Million People so these now suspended pages 80,000 post reached an estimated 126 million real people more than onethird of the population this is the astonishing reach of just one group in st. Petersburg and i doubt the Internet Research agency represents the only russian trolls out there. Facebook has more work to do to see how deep this goes including the reach we just found in the last 48 hours of the aisle at Instagram Post of 80,000 from the trolls and 120,000 pieces of content on instagram and we dont even have that data to much the content reached. Anonymity provided by twitter in the speed by which it shares news makes it ideal to spread disinformation and according to one study, a junk news outperformed real news in the battleground states leading up to election day. Another study found fox generated one out of five every political messages posted on twitter over the entire president ial campaign. Twitter seems to be vastly underestimating the number of fake accounts or bots pushing misinformation. Those who testified before the committee have estimated 15 percent of active twitter accounts were potentially 45 million that were fake or automated despite how to reach those researchers that uncovered only a small piece of that activity over the last few days the numbers have gone 200 accounts over 2700 so there is more to be done. So to continue to have problems with fake news or propaganda we cannot necessarily a tribute to those russian efforts with those unsubstantiated rumors that was elevated on end Google Search on the recent Mass Shootings and las vegas. Meanwhile youtube is the platform now there has been 1100 videos associated with russian imaging and much more of your content will be spread to other platforms that we need to do more the United States government is incapable to meet the 21st century challenge but i believe this effort sufferers in part because of lack of leadership at the top for good the president remains unwilling to a knowledge of threat to russia opposes to our democracy. Angelou delegitimize american in journalism to address the very real threat posed by russian propaganda. I believe Congress Must do more and we need to recognize it was not built to address these threats. What i believe the most legislative approach was to help with this would review it is a National Security bill intended to protect elections from the influence he all want to avoid so most importantly the American People and we need to take a more discerning approach to what were sharing into were connecting with online and recognize the other end of the facebook for twitter argument may not be a real person at all because the fact is that has already proved the cost effectiveness and successively can be assured that other adversaries, including foreign intelligence operatives and terrorist organizations potentially have read the play book and are already taking action why we must act. I hope youll detail will be sought in the last election and tell us what steps he will undertake to get ready for the next we welcome your presentation and encourage your commitment. Day solis where to tell the truth and the whole truth so help you god . Please be seated. Chairman, vicechairman and distinguished members of the committee thank you for in this opportunity to appear before you today. Since july 2013 i have served as a general counsel of facebook. We appreciate the committees hard work to investigate russian interference in the 2016 election so our mission is to create technology to give people the power to bring the world closer together we are proud that each of you use facebook to connect to their constituents and ammunition and the people you represent expect of the antic experiences and they come to our platform to share and connect we also believe we have an Important Role to play in the democratic process and the responsibility to protect that on our platform. That is why we take that seriously on facebook. It is reprehensible because foreign actors hiding behind fake accounts have libyas the platform to have division and discord to undermine the election process directly contrary to move our values and everything we stand for the goal is to bring people closer together in these foreign actors drive that for word. In our investigation which continues to this day has found they used fake account accounts on facebook and instagram to reach millions of americans over a twoyear period and those pages is that hosted more content than they shared the post. Many of these are downright offensive we know much of this is hurtful to members of the Facebook Community believing it was authentic people should not have to worry that theyre in a cynical effort pray on our society to inflame this course. So in an aggregate what we have discussed today is a very small fraction of the content but any amount is too much because all of those while the policies and we removed them. So Going Forward were making significant vestments and hiring and doubling the security engineering efforts to put in place content restrictions with the tools to improve ad transparency in requiring documentation to build Artificial Intelligence with bad actors. And working more closely with industries with shared information to identify the threats so we can all respond faster and more effectively. And expanding efforts to work closely with lawenforcement. We know bad actors will not stop their efforts in the all have to keep learning and improving to stay ahead of them her also we cannot do this alone. Thanks for this investigation with afford to the conclusions you will share with the American Public and ill forward to your questions. Chairman, vicechairman and members of the committee, twitter understand importance of the inquiry so we appreciate the opportunity to be here today. And that is chiefly concerning to the broader community. To have a service that fosters and facilitates democratic debate the most positive change in the world. So the power of twitter was misused by a foreign director for the purpose to influence the president ial election to undermine those in the democratic process. So with that statesponsored is a new challenge for us and were determined to meet we intend to show the committee how serious your about addressing the new threat by understanding what happened understanding it does not happen again her correct the time of the 2016 election we have been instances of malicious activity so be resolved to strengthen the systems Going Forward and they continue all the time so the First Priority is to do all we could to block malicious activity. We have dedicated teams to enhance the quality of information the user c and block whenever or wherever we find it. They continue to work every day to make sure twitter remain safe and open and transparent platform. Also launching a retrospective revue to influence the 2016 election through coordinated activity in the advertising. We have made the decisions to review in the interest of transparency. We decide to recognize as they are supplemented and to discover more facts to gain a greater understanding. Bayreuth and testimony details that methodology of the retrospective revue be steady tweets through november 15th 2016 during that time weve found automated and coordinated activity. Those of data bank to russia about one onehundredth of a percent of the total twitter count. Onethird of 1 came from the winked automated accounts but in those instances it was more pronounced. So with that Internet Research agency as a result. We have determined that advertising the seven small accounts that was violating the policy is in effect at the time or have been implemented. They banned all users has advertisers him looked for the research of civic the engagement. We are making meaningful improvements based on our findings and last week we made changes to advertising policies to protect our platforms and enhancing sharpening tools for stopping militias activity with public understanding of all of these areas. To abuse th