Body parts from threatened wildlife widely sold on Facebook
Body parts from threatened wildlife widely sold on
Facebook
Michael Biesecker and Michael Liedtke, Associated Press •
April 9, 2018
Facebook puts ads on pages illegally selling animal parts
This screen grab from a Facebook group and photographed
on a computer screen in Washington, Monday, April 9, 2018, shows what appears
to be a bucket of tiger teeth offered for sale on a Facebook page. In a complaint
filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, wildlife preservation
advocates allege that Facebook's failure to stop illicit traders utilizing its
platform for illegal activity violates the social network's responsibilities as
a publicly traded company. (AP Photo)
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Facebook is displaying advertisements
for well-known American corporations on group pages operated by overseas
wildlife traffickers illegally selling the body parts of threatened animals,
including elephant ivory, rhino horn and tiger teeth.
In a secret complaint filed with the Securities and
Exchange Commission, wildlife preservation advocates allege that Facebook's
failure to stop illicit traders using its service for illegal activity violates
the social network's responsibilities as a publicly traded company.
Facebook didn't respond to requests for comment. Its CEO,
Mark Zuckerberg, was expected to testify on Capitol Hill on Tuesday about other
issues.
The complaint, a copy of which was provided to The
Associated Press, was initially filed in August on behalf of an undercover
informant represented by the National Whistleblower Center, a non-profit legal
advocacy group. The identity of the informant, who recorded video of
face-to-face meetings with wildlife traffickers set up over Facebook, has been
kept confidential out of safety concerns.
The SEC declined to comment Monday on whether the
whistleblower complaint triggered an investigation of the company.
"Facebook is not an innocent bystander to these
crimes," said Stephen Kohn, executive director of the National
Whistleblower Center. "Facebook sold advertisements on the very pages the
illegal ivory was being marketed."
Facebook is one of 20 technology companies that last
month joined the Global Coalition to End Wildlife Trafficking Online, which was
organized by Google and the World Wildlife Fund. Weeks after the March 7
announcement, an AP reporter was able to see scores of internationally banned
wildlife products for sale in public and private Facebook groups, most based in
Southeast Asia.
Among the items available were belts made from what
appeared to be the fur of Bengal tigers, a critically endangered species with
only about 2,500 still living in the wild. Also advertised were horns from
black rhinos, a species heavily targeted by poachers with little more than
5,000 still roaming Africa.
Negotiations over price and delivery are often initiated
by Facebook Messenger. Instagram and WhatsApp, two social media platforms also
owned by Facebook, are also sometimes used by traffickers.
The allegations tying Facebook to the illegal trafficking
of wildlife are surfacing while the company is already scrambling to recover
from a privacy scandal that has wiped out $79 billion in shareholder wealth
during the past three weeks.
The crisis stems from revelations that Cambridge
Analytica, a data-mining firm connected to President Donald Trump's successful
2016 campaign, had exploited weaknesses in Facebook's privacy controls to
collect personal information about 87 million people without their consent.
Zuckerberg will try to reverse the backlash against the
company when he opens two days of testimony in Congress. His appearance will
give lawmakers the opportunity to grill him about the Cambridge Analytica
episode, as well as evidence that Russian agents manipulated Facebook's network
to spread false information that may have swayed the 2016 election.
The SEC complaint may trigger other lines of inquiry
about how much of Facebook's annual revenue of $41 billion has been generated
by ads running on pages featuring illegal activity, such as the sale of
elephant ivory and tiger teeth.
Facebook hasn't disclosed that some of its revenue may be
tied to illegal trafficking in wildlife in regulatory filings that are supposed
to outline various risks and other threats that could crimp its profits or
stock price.
Trafficking investigators say they have seen no drop off
in the illegal products offered for sale on Facebook after prior public pledges
by the company to crack down. They are calling on federal security regulators
to force Facebook to immediately freeze accounts being used by illegal
traffickers and cooperate with international law enforcement to identify the
individuals involved for prosecution.
"The amount of ivory being traded on Facebook is
horrifying," said Gretchen Peters, executive director of the Center on
Illicit Networks and Transnational Organized Crime, which has analyzed online
groups where wildlife goods are being marketed. "I have looked at
thousands of posts containing ivory, and I am convinced that Facebook is
literally facilitating the extinction of the elephant species."
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