Boris and Cambridge Analytica

lemongrove, you seem extraordinarily naïve about the extent and power of the internet.

You are right, GrannyGravy. Internet manipulation is here to stay. Anybody interested in democracy needs to acknowledge it and recognise they have almost certainly been a victim.

Oooh - those are good initials lemon

I like changing my title on the drop down menus you get - my very favourite was Admiral of the Fleet, but I usually choose Reverend, Captain, Lady or Professor. It’s very disappointing when you only get the usual Mr/Ms/Mrs - where’s the fun in that?

The gin was very nice btw, and as everyone knows, Scottish gin is best ???????

My maiden initials are AIBU jura and am proud to share it
?

Blimey, kids on GN- who'd have thought - the day of DD1 and year of DD2 - you could almost be my daughter - OMG (my maiden initials too - uncanny).

I agree GrannyG the Internet is like Pandora’s Box, once things are let out, they stay out.
It’s simply the new way of advertising ( targeting) even the supermarkets know exactly what we like, as does Amazon.

Wash yer mouth out with soap and water Varian.......you may be that age, I’m certainly not ( but accept that one day in the distant future I may well be.)

Internet based “targeting” is here to stay, not one country/leader will /can unilaterally make it illegal.

Basically it is down to politics being taught without bias in schools, including the pitfalls of targeted “political pop-ups” on social media.

varian??????? lovely.

It is surprising that a very young granny born in 1975 can do such a convincing impression of a seventy-five year old blue rinsed member of the Tory Party.

I don’t mind being honest about my birthday....
29th June 1975 ?

Everyone would be wise to change their date of birth on profiles.
Do people actually give their real dob?

But don't be complacent.

And never ever have a gin or a before you vote. Could affect your judgement!

That is not addressed to you, growstuff as you've said you do not imbibe alcohol.

We need to counter the populist argument be asking-

"who are the people?"

and

"who are the elites?"

It is quite astounding. One of our parliamentary committees after looking at CA and Facebook for 18 months concluded that the U.K.s electoral laws are not fit for purpose. We cannot have a free and fair election in the U.K. They understand that individuals have been identified as being open to suggestion (they are known as persuadable) and were manipulated into behaviour change. The technology that was developed to connect us all is now being used to drive us apart.

Authoritarian governments are on the rise and using the politics of hate and fear.

Brazil a nasty right wing extremist was elected . Facebook clearly implicated in the dissemination of fake news there
during the elections.

Myanmar - Facebook used to incite racial hatred which caused a genocide.

Russian government used Facebook in the USA. They targeted individuals by using their personal data and fed them fake news stories.
Stoking fear and hate to turn the country against itself
Divide and conquer.
All this was a key part of the Muller investigation.

It is the manipulation of us all as individuals.

gmarie good to hear from someone from another country and how we parallel each other so much in the way our country has become so terribly divided, and seemingly like the USA we have rejected expert advice based on sound academic research, but prefer to believe the propaganda spewing from the media with clear agenda or, are as Persuadables being bombarded by various companies like Cambridge Analytica to change our behaviour, and vote in a particular way.

It is an extraordinary time we are living through. The U.K. has never seen such a period and very likely after 31 October will see the sort of chaos that we experienced inWW2.

lemon, you obviously had far too much - Nessie is on the bottle, not inside

Every social media company is collecting data. They are no more trustworthy than Cambridge Analytica. I sometimes go to access some information to be met by the message that they collect data about me so they can 'best provide me with personalised information'. At that point I leave the site. Online news sources may harvest the letters and comments to know more about the writers. Facebook, Google, Twitter and so many other data gathering companies are private companies.

Everyone would be wise to change their date of birth on profiles. Confound them by either adding or subtracting years from your age and changing your gender.

Hi, again, from the USA. I continue to follow your current news and see so many parallels to what's going on here in the states. It will always be difficult for liberals (like me) and conservatives to agree on any number of issues and to make decisions about what direction we want to take to address any problems that arise.

What's upsetting me right now is that we can't seem to agree on anything anymore, even things that used to be nonpolitical or nonpartisan. Over here, we just finished listening to hearings about our president's obstructive and illegal behavior and yet we can't come together about the most basic things - like not letting foreign governments meddle in our election process, appreciating and BELIEVING reputable press and newspapers like the NY Times and our intelligence gathering agencies

What's happened that we can't even agree that throwing children in cages is horrible?

We all used to think that narcissistic, bloviating candidates were disgusting. I didn't agree with Presidents Bush or Reagan much of the time but I respected them!

SirChenjin you've always been search engine since I first worked it out, and search engine you will remain, despite my love of a nice G&T

Cambridge Analytica are a huge concern, along with all the other sources mining our data. I imagine we all think we personally would not be susceptible to their techniques, but I doubt we are quite as immune as we'd like to believe.

I tried that once jura....it had something swimming about in it! ?

Definitely Scottish from the Lochness Distillery.

I recommend gin from The Cotswold Gin Company.Hic.?

I understand now. But don't be complacent. Complacency is the enemy of democracy.

The gin reference was for SirChenjin!