Facebook Portal Faces Bumpy Start in New Year

Back in October of 2018, Facebook joined other high tech giants, like Apple, with the rollout of a product called Portal and Portal+. Portal is a live video/audio connection from a 10-inch or 15-inch screen, that you sit on the table and operate by voice command.  Portal allows you to connect to your Facebook friends list and from Messanger as well. From the start, some people were suspicious, as the introductory price seemed awfully low.

A mere $200 seemed odd and gave buyers pause. Then just four days later Facebook revealed more bad news: Portal announced in a blog post that 30 million Facebook accounts were hacked by unnamed attackers.

Remember just a month before on September 28, Facebook VP Guy Rosen wrote a blog post telling Facebookers that they experienced a “security issue affecting almost 50 million accounts,” where unnamed attackers used a vulnerability to access millions of users’ accounts.

That was roughly 80 millions accounts hacked in 2 months.

Add that to the scandal of Facebook sharing users data with Cambridge Analytica during the 2016 elections. Facebook took a huge hit in its market value, some estimate they lost billions overnight. Mark Zuckerberg was called before Congress in a nationally televised session. Mostly viewers were exposed to how little most elected officials understood about the internet and Facebook. And it showed the Facebook CEO looking very nervous. Perhaps he was thinking that if the Congress did figure out what was going on, they might actually put restrictions on the social media industry.

That and other security issues led to a black eye for Facebook when it comes to users trusting them with data.

This week in an article from businessinsider.com, Facebook employees were uncovered adding 5-star reviews to the Facebook Portal posts. Someone recognized many of the names raving about the Portal and compared it to a FB employees list. Bingo. Several names matched up.

In the Tweet below Kevin Roose calls out FB for violating one Amazon’s basic rules. The response is from Boz. Boz is a vice president at FB.

But the problems Facebook has in the United States pale compared to issues they are having overseas, especially in Myanmar. The New York Times story explaining those problems is available here.

As we said, it’s a bumpy start for Facebook 2019. Read more at businessinsider.com

The full story on the “Portal,” can be found by clicking hard: The curious timing of Facebook’s first hardware product, the $200 “Portal”

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Facebook Portal Faces A Bumpy Start To 2019

Back in October of 2018, Facebook joined other high tech giants, like Apple, with the rollout of a product called Portal and Portal+. Portal is a live video/audio connection from a 10-inch or 15-inch screen, that you sit on the table and operate by voice command.  Portal allows you to connect to your Facebook friends list and from Messanger as well. From the start, some people were suspicious, as the price it was introduced at seemed awfully low.  $200 seemed odd and gave buyers pause. Then just four days later Facebook revealed more bad news. Portal, the company announced in a blog post that 30 million Facebook accounts were hacked by unnamed attackers.

Remember just a month before on September 28, Facebook VP Guy Rosen wrote a blog post telling Facebookers that they experienced a “security issue affecting almost 50 million accounts,” where unnamed attackers used a vulnerability to access millions of users’ accounts.

That was roughly 80 millions accounts hacked in 2 months.

Add that to the scandal of Facebook sharing users data with Cambridge Analytica during the 2016 elections. Facebook took a huge hit in its market value, some estimate they lost billions overnight. Mark Zuckerberg was called before Congress in a nationally televised session. Mostly the viewers were exposed to how little most of the elected officials understood about the internet and Facebook. And it showed the Facebook CEO looking very nervous. Perhaps he was thinking that if the Congress did figure out what was going on they might actually put restrictions on the social media industry.

That and other security issues led to a black eye for Facebook when it comes to users trusting them with data.

This week in an article from businessinsider.com, we discover that Facebook employees were uncovered adding 5-star reviews to the Facebook Portal posts. Someone recognized many of the names raving about the Portal and compared it to a FB employees list. Bingo. Several names matched up.

In the Tweet below Kevin Roose calls out FB for violating one Amazon’s basic rules. The response is from Boz. Boz is a vice president at FB.

But the problems Facebook has in the US pales compared to issues they are having overseas, especially in Myanmar. The New York Times story explaining those problems is available here.

As we said, its a bumpy start for Facebook 2019.

 You can read more at businessinsider.com

And you might like The curious timing of Facebook’s first hardware product, the $200 “Portal”

[

Facebook Portal Faces A Bumpy Start To 2019

Back in October of 2018, Facebook joined other high tech giants, like Apple, with the rollout of a product called Portal and Portal+. Portal is a live video/audio connection from a 10-inch or 15-inch screen, that you sit on the table and operate by voice command.  Portal allows you to connect to your Facebook friends list and from Messanger as well. From the start, some people were suspicious, as the price it was introduced at seemed awfully low.  $200 seemed odd and gave buyers pause. Then just four days later Facebook revealed more bad news. Portal, the company announced in a blog post that 30 million Facebook accounts were hacked by unnamed attackers.

Remember just a month before on September 28, Facebook VP Guy Rosen wrote a blog post telling Facebookers that they experienced a “security issue affecting almost 50 million accounts,” where unnamed attackers used a vulnerability to access millions of users’ accounts.

That was roughly 80 millions accounts hacked in 2 months.

Add that to the scandal of Facebook sharing users data with Cambridge Analytica during the 2016 elections. Facebook took a huge hit in its market value, some estimate they lost billions overnight. Mark Zuckerberg was called before Congress in a nationally televised session. Mostly the viewers were exposed to how little most of the elected officials understood about the internet and Facebook. And it showed the Facebook CEO looking very nervous. Perhaps he was thinking that if the Congress did figure out what was going on they might actually put restrictions on the social media industry.

That and other security issues led to a black eye for Facebook when it comes to users trusting them with data.

This week in an article from businessinsider.com, we discover that Facebook employees were uncovered adding 5-star reviews to the Facebook Portal posts. Someone recognized many of the names raving about the Portal and compared it to a FB employees list. Bingo. Several names matched up.

In the Tweet below Kevin Roose calls out FB for violating one Amazon’s basic rules. The response is from Boz. Boz is a vice president at FB.

But the problems Facebook has in the US pales compared to issues they are having overseas, especially in Myanmar. The New York Times story explaining those problems is available here.

As we said, its a bumpy start for Facebook 2019.

 You can read more at businessinsider.com

And you might like The curious timing of Facebook’s first hardware product, the $200 “Portal”