Overnight Tech: UK considers regulating Facebook, Google as news outlets | FEC revisits rules for online political ads | Russia to crack down on bitcoin

by Harper Neidig and Ali Breland - 10/10/17 7:46 PM ET

UK REVIEWING FACEBOOK, GOOGLE ROLES IN NEWS PUBLISHING: The United Kingdom is looking at Facebook and Google’s role in news and what that could mean in terms of more regulation.

“We are looking at the role Google and Facebook play in the news environment,” a spokesman for British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Tuesday, according to Reuters. “As part of that work we will look carefully at the roles, responsibility and legal status of the major internet platforms.”

Following recent terror attacks, May has criticized internet companies for not doing more to prevent terrorists from using their platforms to organize and communicate. May has also floated regulating the internet.

Tuesday’s statement from May’s office comes after the chairman of the Office of Communications, or Ofcom, Britain’s media regulator, said she believes Facebook and Google are actually publishers and thus subject to the same regulations as news outlets.

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“My personal view is that they are publishers but that is only my personal view, that is not an Ofcom view,” Ofcom Chairman Dame Patricia Hodgson told British members of Parliament during a hearing on Tuesday, according to The Guardian. “As I said, Ofcom is simply concerned about the integrity of news and very supportive of the debate and the steps that are being taken.”

During the meeting Hodgson also revealed that Ofcom’s board had discussed how the internet could be regulated last week.

Read more here.

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FEC REVISITS AD DISCLOSURE RULES: The Federal Election Commission (FEC) is asking for public input on its disclosure rules for online political advertisements, as companies like Facebook and Google face scrutiny over ads they ran during the 2016 presidential campaign.

The FEC announced on Tuesday they are reopening the public comment period on the rules nearly a year after the last time they sought public input on the disclosure requirement.

“In light of developments since the close of the last comment period, the Commission is reopening the comment period once again to consider disclaimer requirements as applied to certain internet communications,” the announcement reads.

The move comes as some lawmakers are pressing for tighter disclosure requirements in the wake of Facebook’s revelation that it had uncovered 3,000 political ads purchased by Russian actors.

Read more here.

FACEBOOK’S SANDBERG TO MEET LAWMAKERS BEFORE RUSSIA HEARING: Facebook’s Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg will meet with lawmakers at the Capitol on Thursday as the company manages the fallout from revelations that Russian actors used Facebook to influence voters during the 2016 elections.

Sandberg’s meetings come in advance of two Congressional hearings on Russian election interference that Facebook will testify at Nov. 1.

Sandberg is slated to sit down with Congressional Black Caucus members, a congressional source with knowledge of the meeting confirmed to The Hill.

The caucus has recently put pressure on the company to provide more answers regarding Russian use of its platform. Three members of the caucus, Reps. Robin Kelly (D-Ill.), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-N.J.) and Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.) sent letters to Facebook and Twitter last week, urging the companies to turn over ads bought by Kremlin-linked actors to the caucus. They also pressed the companies to hire more people of color to their boards, according to Recode.

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REPORT: RUSSIAN FACEBOOK ACCOUNTS PROMOTED U.S. CONTENT: Some fake Facebook accounts, reportedly used by Russians to purchase political ads on the site, primarily trafficked content created in the U.S., according to a New York Times investigation.

Facebook in late September made public that thousands of political ads were purchased by Russian-linked groups. A slew of revelations on the Facebook pages has since emerged, including how the fake social accounts were used to create division during the 2016 presidential campaign.

The users, which Facebook said were connected to a Russian “troll farm” called the Internet Research Agency, created liberal and conservative pages like “Blacktivist,” “Secured Borders” and “Being Patriotic.” According to the Times, they used the pages to repost content created by activists and commentators to generate traffic.

Read more here.

RUSSIA TO CRACK DOWN ON BITCOIN: Russia looked poised for a crackdown on cryptocurrencies Tuesday, after Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called cryptocurrencies risky and the country’s central bank said it would block websites selling bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.

Russia’s decision to clamp down on digital currencies comes one month after Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said that he would move to regulate bitcoin use.

On Tuesday, Sergei Shvetsov, a top official at the Russian central bank, criticized bitcoin transactions as “dubious.”

Read more here.

PENCE AIDE JOINS ORACLE: Josh Pitcock, a former chief of staff to Vice President Pence, is joining the technology company Oracle, Politico reported Tuesday.

Pitcock had worked for Pence for 12 years, starting when the Indiana Republican was a member of the House.

According to Politico, Pitcock will serve as Oracle’s vice president of government affairs.

Read more here.

EQUIFAX SAYS BREACH AFFECTED 700K BRITISH CONSUMERS: Equifax revealed on Tuesday that hackers accessed information on nearly 700,000 British consumers in a breach earlier this year, significantly more than initially believed.

The credit reporting firm said in a statement that hackers accessed a file containing 15.2 million United Kingdom records from between 2011 and 2016. Equifax analyzed the data, concluding that information on a total of 693,665 U.K. consumers was impacted.

Initially, the company said that information on potentially 400,000 U.K. consumers had been accessed.

Read more here.

ON TAP:

The DC 5G Summit starts at 8:15 a.m.

Forum will hold its Annual Internet of Things Global Summit at the National Press Club on Wednesday.

The Federal Communications Bar Association will hold a mass media committee brown bag lunch at 12:15 p.m. to discuss spectrum.

The Atlantic Council holds a cybersecurity panel at 5 p.m.

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