The Washington Post - 07.03.2020

A16 eZ re THE WASHINGTON POST.SATURDAy, MARCH 7 , 2020

tHe MArKets

6 Monitor your investments at washingtonpost.com/markets data and graphics by

Exchange-Traded
(Ticker) 5D % Chg
$490 $

Coffee (COFF.L) -1.
Copper (COPA.L) 0.
Corn (CORN.L) 2.
Cotton (COTN.L) 2.
Crude Oil (CRUD.L) -5.
Gasoline (UGAS.L) -5.
Gold (BULL.L) 5.
Natural Gas (NGAS.L) 1.
Silver (SLVR.L) 2.

Data and graphics by:

New Car Loan Natl

4.

Currency Exchange

Close

8,575.

2-yr note

Yield:

0.51%

Markets YTD % Chg

Americas Close

Weekly

% Chg

-15.3% +15.3%

BRAZIL IBOVESPA INDEX 97996.80 -5.

S&P/TSX COMPOSITE INDEX 16175.02 -0.

S&P/BMV IPC 41388.78 0.

S&P 500 Industry Group Snapshot

Industry Group

Weekly

% Chg

-46.2% Chg % 1Yr +46.2%

Food & Staples Retailing 9.

Water Utilities 9.

Health Care Providers 8.

Electric Utilities 7.

Household Products 7.

Energy Equipment & Svcs -13.

Commercial Banks -8.

Automobiles -6.

Oil, Gas, Consumable Fuel -6.

Leisure Equipment & Prod -5.

$1000 invested over 1 Month

Bloomberg

MAMJJASONDJFM

24,

27,

29,

'

LIBOR 3-Month

1.00%

5D % Change

1.8%

Bank Prime

4.25%

EU €

0.

Money Market Natl

0.

MAMJJASONDJFM

7,

8,

9,

'

DOW JONES

Consumer Rates

$1000 invested over 1 Year

Asia Pacific -12.3% +12.3%

S&P/ASX 200 INDEX 6216.21 -2.

CSI 300 INDEX 4138.51 5.

HANG SENG INDEX 26146.67 0.

NIKKEI 225 20749.75 -1.

INTERNATIONAL STOCK MARKETS

10-yr note

Yield:

0.76%

Japan ¥

105.

'

1Yr CD Natl

1.

5D % Change

0.1%

1-Yr ARM

3.38%

RATES

STANDARD & POOR'S

Note: Bank prime is from 10 major banks. Federal Funds rate is the market

rate, which can vary from the federal target rate. LIBOR is the London

Interbank Offered Rate. Consumer rates are from Bankrate. All figures as of

4:30 p.m. New York time.

Close

2,972.

Britain £

0.

COMMODITIES

30-Yr Fixed mtge

3.66%

5-yr note

Yield:

0.61%

5Yr CD Natl

1.

NASDAQ COMPOSITE INDEX

Federal Funds

1.25%

YTD % Change

-4.4%

Mexico $

20.

15-Yr Fixed mtge

3.02%

6-month bill

Yield:

0.38%

YTD % Change

-8.0%

6Mo CD Natl

0.

Home Equity Loan Natl

6.

MAMJJASONDJFM

2,

3,

3,

'

Canada $

1.

Gainers and Losers from the S&P 1500 Index

Company Close

5D %

Chg

Exterran Corp 6.58 29.

BJ's Wholesale Club 23.91 24.

Cincinnati Bell Inc 15.89 21.

CogentCommunications87.00 19.

AeroVironment Inc61.15 19.

TEGNA Inc 17.00 18.

Core-Mark Holding Co 27.07 17.

Safehold Inc 64.24 17.

Cabot Oil & GasCorp 16.37 17.

Newmont Corp 52.35 17.

First Amer Financial 66.49 16.

Gilead SciencesInc 80.22 15.

Watsco Inc 181.03 15.

Ligand Pharma 107.55 14.

Humana Inc 367.01 14.

Campbell Soup Co 51.76 14.

eHealth Inc 134.44 14.

Amer States Water Co 87.78 14.

GEO Group Inc/The16.78 14.

Lennox International 260.21 14.

Company Close

5D %

Chg

Oasis Petroleum Inc 0.86 -47.

Nabors Industries 0.96 -45.

Callon Petroleum Co 1.30 -42.

SM Energy Co 3.82 -41.

HighPoint Resources 0.41 -39.

Gulfport Energy Corp 0.50 -38.

Noble Corp plc 0.43 -38.

Valaris plc 2.32 -37.

QEP Resources Inc 1.44 -36.

Laredo Petroleum Inc 0.70 -35.

Eldorado Resorts Inc 33.65 -32.

Red Robin Grmt Brgrs 18.50 -32.

Diamond Offsh Drlng 2.06 -32.

Matador Resources Co 6.55 -32.

Penn Virginia Corp 10.89 -31.

WPX Energy Inc 6.50 -30.

CypressSemiconductor 16.37 -29.

US Silica Inc 3.28 -28.

Rayonier Adv Matrl 1.76 -28.

Whiting Petroleum 1.33 -28.

Brazil R$

4.

5D % Change

0.6%

Close

25,864.

YTD % Change

-9.4%

Futures Close 5D % Chg
Copper 2.56 0.
Crude Oil 41.28 -7.
Gold 1672.40 6.
Natural Gas 1.71 1.
Orange Juice 0.97 0.

Futures Close 5D % Chg

Silver 17.26 4.

Sugar 13.02 -7.

Soybean 8.91 -0.

Wheat 5.16 -1.

Corn 3.76 2.

Dow Jones 30 Industrials

Company Close 5D %Chg Chg %YTD

3M Co 153.65 3.0 -12.
AmerExpCo 108.24 -1.5 -13.
Apple Inc 289.03 5.7 -2.
Boeing 262.33 -4.6 -20.
Caterpillr 121.41 -2.3 -18.
Chevron 95.32 2.1 -21.
Cisco Sys 39.68 -0.6 -17.
Coca-Cola 55.26 3.3 -0.
Dow Inc 38.97 -3.6 -29.
ExxonMobil 47.69 -7.3 -31.
Gldman Schs 192.85 -3.9 -16.
Home Depot 228.51 4.9 4.
IBM 127.73 -1.9 -4.
Intel Corp 55.77 0.5 -7.
J&J 142.03 5.6 -2.

Company Close 5D %Chg Chg %YTD

JPMorgan 108.08 -6.9 -22.

McDonald's 198.86 2.4 -0.

Merck & Co 82.20 7.4 -9.

Microsoft 161.57 -0.3 1.

NIKE Inc 88.36 -1.1 -13.

Pfizer Inc 35.02 4.8 -10.

Prcter& Gmbl 121.66 7.4 -2.

Travelers Cos I 124.84 4.2 -9.

UnitedTech 126.48 -3.1 -15.

UntdHlthGr 283.87 11.3 -3.

Verzn Comm 56.87 5.0 -7.

Visa Inc 184.36 1.4 -2.

Walgreens 50.51 10.4 -14.

Walmart 117.23 8.9 -1.

Walt Disney 115.27 -2.0 -21.

Europe -14.4% +14.4%

STXE 600 (EUR) Pr 366.80 -2.

CAC 40 INDEX 5139.11 -3.

DAX INDEX 11541.87 -2.

FTSE 100 INDEX 6462.55 -1.

BY TONY ROMM

AND ISAAC STANLEY-BECKER

The Facebook ad purchased by
a page called “A ngry Buckeyes” in
December seemed ordinary at
first: It cited a news article that
claimed President Trump’s tariffs
on China could cost Americans.
But the ad actually belonged to
an apparent cluster of pages that
paid to promote s imilar messages,
didn’t fully disclose their backers
and sought to influence voters in
key battleground states — defi-
ciencies that have cast fresh doubt
on Facebook’s efforts to protect
users from m anipulation.
The discovery is one of several
weaknesses uncovered by experts
at New York University’s Ta ndon
School of Engineering, who per-
formed a security audit of Face-
book’s online ad archive between
May 2018 and June 2019. Their
conclusions, spelled o ut in a p aper
shared with The Washington Post,
point to myriad o pportunities ma-
licious actors may have had to
exploit the platform’s powerful
targeting tools while hiding their
tracks, misleading u sers a nd evad-
ing Facebook’s e nforcement.
In the years after Russian
agents weaponized the social-net-
working platform as part of their
sweeping efforts to interfere with
the 2016 presidential election, Fa-
cebook developed verification
measures designed to prevent for-
eign actors f rom purchasing polit-
ical ads. It also undertook trans-
parency initiatives that placed
paid posts in a public archive. But
researchers L aura Edelson, Tobias
Lauringer and Damon McCoy
wrote that they found defects that
still could “enable a malicious ad-
vertiser to avoid accurate disclo-
sure of their political a ds.”
More than 8 6,000 Facebook
pages ran at least one political ad
that was not properly disclosed,
according to the report. Facebook
later caught and included these
ads in its archive, but it remains
unclear whether the company
ever fully vetted nearly 80 percent
of the pages that paid to promote
their m essages in t he first place.
Roughly 20,000 ads also had
been purchased by “likely inau-
thentic communities,” according
to the r eport, defined as clusters of
pages that appear to be linked
because they promoted the same
or similar messages. That includ-
ed businesses looking to advance
their interests without clear fin-

gerprints, for example, and more

opaque entities that hawked po-

tentially fraudulent insurance

products. These ads touched on

political t hemes, resulting in t heir

being included in Facebook’s ar-

chive.

In one example, the Facebook

page Angry Buckeyes, followed by

21,000 users, appeared to belong

to a cluster of pages organized

around topics including race, reli-

gion and other traits. Researchers

discovered the link because some

of the pages in the cluster ran

identical ads. Nowhere, however,

did the pages disclose their possi-

bly s hared roots. T he l ack of trans-

parency troubled t he t rio of d igital

experts, who expressed fear that

“the disinformation campaign”

orchestrated by this cluster was

“attempting to sway v oters” i n key

political s wing s tates.

Facebook said that in recent

months it had remedied the defi-

ciencies that researchers identi-

fied in their study. The company,

for e xample, has s ought to require

more information about Facebook

pages — who is behind them and

who is paying for their ads.

“Our authorization and trans-

parency measures have meaning-

fully changed since this research

was conducted,” spokesman Joe

Osborne said in a statement. “We

offer more transparency into po-

litical and issue advertising than

TV, radio or any other digital ad

platform.”

But Edelson, one of the authors

of the NYU study, said some con-

cerns persist — including fears

that Facebook isn’t aggressively

enforcing its own rules.

“Facebook’s ad platform and

their transparency mechanisms

were simply not built with securi-

ty i n mind,” E delson s aid.

The researchers’ findings could

seed further doubt among regula-

tors and the public about Face-

book’s preparedness for the 2020

presidential election. In 2016,

Russian agents u sed narrowly tar-

geted political ads to bait unsus-

pecting users into joining seem-

ingly innocuous pages and

groups, where they were then

bombarded with divisive and false

posts, p hotos a nd videos.

In recent years, Facebook has

sought to toughen its defenses. It

hired more workers to review its

site and put in place new policies

to stamp out what it labels “coor-

dinated, inauthentic behavior,” r e-

sulting in the removals of ac-

counts a nd o ther content linked to

Russia and m alicious actors. Face-

book CEO Mark Zuckerberg since

has touted recent successes in

elections around the world, in-

cluding the 2 018 congressional

midterms.

Central to Facebook’s transpar-

ency efforts is its a d archive, which

it unveiled in 2018 under pressure

from lawmakers. The public re-

pository shows that campaigns,

businesses and other organiza-

tions have spent roughly $1.1 bil-

lion on ads since the repository

came online. But it also reflects a

wide array of misleading or trou-

bling ads about drugs, insurance

and h ousing, and false, paid politi-

cal posts from candidates includ-

ing President Trump, that Face-

book has r efused to remove.

In their study, NYU researchers

point to other troubles. Sixteen

clusters of Facebook pages, for ex-

ample, purchased roughly

$3.8 million in potentially prob-

lematic political ads. These “inau-

thentic communities” included

pages named “Our Part of Ohio,”

which focused on users in the

state, or “Giving Care,” which pri-

marily served as a hub for seniors.

Much of the content on these pag-

es was apolitical, the NYU report

found, but p eriodically they w ould

purchase political ads that con-

tained similar or near-identical

text.

In May, for example, the page

Giving Care ran a national ad,

about the high costs of prescrip-

tion drugs, viewed up to 5,

times. Another page, called “Mid-

dle Class Voices of Pennsylvania,”

ran the e xact same ad, at the e xact

same time, reaching many of the

same states. Neither page, howev-

er, indicated t hat it might be affili-

ated with the other, or disclosed

the person or organization that

funded the ad, the report found.

That raised concerns among re-

searchers that the activity might

be coordinated and inauthentic.

Attempts to reach the owners of

the pages over Facebook were un-

successful.

Some businesses, meanwhile,

engaged in “astroturfing” — set-

ting up seemingly fake entities to

push messages that benefit their

for-profit businesses. In o ne exam-

ple, researchers found ads from

pages called “Isabella Wind” and

“Neosho Ridge Wind” that paid to

promote the exact same message

— about the economic benefits of

wind power for farmers — in dif-

ferent parts o f the country. O nly b y

navigating off Facebook would a

user discover they are part of the

same energy firm.

Still another cluster of 13 pages

identified by researchers sold

questionable insurance products,

including “TrumpCare,” seeking

to play off the p resident’s s upport-

ers to sell coverage. One page in

this group, called “National Veter-

an Loans,” sought to pitch former

military service members in Ne-

vada, Florida and elsewhere on

home-financing o ptions.

These Facebook pages often

were viewed by older users, re-

searchers said, relying on seem-

ingly innocuous names. But some

of the ads didn’t link to legally

registered businesses, the report

found, concluding they are “likely

violating Facebook’s policies.”

Some of the organizations contin-

ue to advertise o n Facebook.

Facebook pointed to some of the

steps it has taken since research-

ers concluded their report. The

company i n October b egan requir-

ing Facebook pages that purchase

political ads to provide m ore i nfor-

mation about their identities, such

as their tax-identification number.

And the tech giant says it now

requires suspicious pages to verify

who i s behind t hem a nd share that

information publicly.

Edelson and her fellow re-

searchers acknowledged some of

those changes would help, partic-

ularly in ensuring large pages and

significant spenders are more

transparent in their ads. But, she

said, Facebook’s efforts to protect

voters from manipulation largely

come down to its o wn vigilance.

“Enforcement r eally needs to be

stepped u p,” s he said.

[email protected]

isaac.stanley-

[email protected]

Report: Many Facebook ads don’t fully disclose backers

Discovery is one of the

weaknesses found in

NYU’s security audit

Andrew Kelly/reUters

A wild week for Wall Street

A trader works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange on Friday. Stocks staged a furious rally in the final hour of trading that

cut in half a rout that had reached 4 percent a fter a tumultuous week dominated by fear of the spreading coronavirus.