Facebook was caught red-handed eleven years ago after it engaged a prominent public relations firm to try to plant stories in major news publications harshly criticising Google’s privacy practises.
In 2018, it engaged Definers, a public relations firm, to conduct opposition research on the company’s opponents, including George Soros, a wealthy philanthropist. Elliot Schrage, Facebook’s longstanding head of communications, accepted responsibility for the employment of Definers and comparable firms and resigned.
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday that Facebook’s parent company, Meta, is employing similar strategies to combat another rival, TikTok. According to the Post, Meta hired Targeted Victory, a Republican consulting firm, to organise a nationwide campaign against TikTok.
According to the Post, Targeted Victory worked with dozens of public relations firms around the country to help change public opinion against TikTok by planting local news articles and helping position anti-TikTok op-eds across the country.
Targeted Victory has been hired by Meta, according to the company.
We believe that all platforms, including TikTok, should be subjected to increased scrutiny in light of their expanding popularity,” said spokesperson Andy Stone in a statement.
Targeted Victory’s CEO, Zac Moffatt, said the firm leads bipartisan teams on behalf of its customers.
We have worked with Meta for several years and are happy of the job we have accomplished, he added in a statement.
Internal Targeted Victory emails acquired by The Washington Post detailed an effort to damage TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese corporation ByteDance. In order to sway public and political sentiment against TikTok, the corporation employed a mix of legitimate concerns and bogus fears.
According to the study, Targeted Victory was also seeking to acquire aggressive coverage of Facebook in local media, including submitting letters and opinion pieces extolling Facebook’s role in aiding Black-owned companies, for example.
We are deeply concerned that the stoking of local media reports on alleged trends that have not been found on the platform could cause real world harm, TikTok said in an emailed statement.
