Noted comic Carrey is deleting his FB page over election interference

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Tue, 06 Feb 2018 - 10:26 GMT

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Tue, 06 Feb 2018 - 10:26 GMT

“What the world needs now is capitalism with a conscience,” Jim Carrey – Photo compiled by Egypt Today

“What the world needs now is capitalism with a conscience,” Jim Carrey – Photo compiled by Egypt Today

CAIRO – 7 February 2018: Actor-comedian Jim Carrey announced Tuesday he is dumping Facebook and deleting his page and urged everyone to do so.


Carrey said, via his Twitter account, the reason behind his decision is because “Facebook profited from Russian interference in our elections and they’re still not doing enough to stop it.”




Carrey told CNBC that activist investors must be encouraged to send a message that “responsible oversight is needed.”


“What the world needs now is capitalism with a conscience,” Carrey told CNBC on Tuesday.


The comedian did not state how many Facebook shares he owns. He added the hashtag #unfriendfacebook.


On Oct. 30, 2017, Facebook announced that Russia-based operatives published about 80,000 posts on the social network over a two year period in an effort to sway U.S. politics, and that about 126 million Americans may have seen the posts during that time.


The Russian government has denied any attempts to sway the election, in which President Donald Trump, a Republican, defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton.


Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch said in the written testimony that the 80,000 posts from Russia's Internet Research Agency were a tiny fraction of content on Facebook, equal to 1 out of 23,000 posts.


The posts though violated Facebook's terms of service and any amount of such activity using fake accounts is too much, Stretch wrote.


"These actions run counter to Facebook's mission of building community and everything we stand for. And we are determined to do everything we can to address this new threat," he wrote.


The 80,000 posts were published between June 2015 and August 2017 and most of them focused on divisive social and political messages such as race relations and gun rights, Facebook said.


According to CNBC, Facebook has also said its algorithms recommended content created by Russian operatives. Initially CEO Mark Zuckerberg said the idea of Facebook impacting the elections was "crazy," but later apologized for dismissing the real concerns.


Carrey also posted the message on his official Facebook page, which has over 5.1 million followers.


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