And of course it's obligatory to point out that these companies did not actually have access to any "special" data, they merely had the same, normal access that hundreds of thousands of app developers had at the time, and which required them to convince a Facebook user to allow access to their account. These companies were merely allowed to keep the older, slightly wider access, for a little while longer than you and me.
Russia was in Crimea and anti-Russian rhetoric / sanctions were going into effect in that time frame. So I would say people were justifiably concerned in 2015 and FB should have known better.
And aside from annexing part of another country and downing a commercial airliner, nothing to see here. Just some light active measures against democratic elections from Russia - not something to get hysterical about.
This is a sensible reaction if you remember nothing of history. Russia is acting out because NATO has crept up to its borders and Russia has been subjected to invasions since Napoleon.
The Russian interference seen so far has been clumsy and of the parts that may have had an impact, they are nothing compared to Bill Clinton's open support of Boris Yeltsin in the 90s and US interference in elections around the world since forever including military coups and the assassination of democratically elected leaders.
While obviously not ideal, the rest of the world is laughing at us.
Of note, the only piece of confirmed meddling has been the alleged disclosure of voting system tampering by a whistle blower, Reality Winner, now facing hard prison time. She has received no cover from the Democratic Party. They are hawks and hypocrites.
The airliner was overflying a warzone. Just like an airliner downed by the United States [1]. I'm not mentioning this to bring up old slights - I'm mentioning this because there is no institutional, moral, or policy reason for why such an event will not happen again, whether it's perpetrated by Russia, India, the United States, or the Free Republic of Boratistan.
Militaries will occasionally shoot at airplanes. Flying airplanes near active military deployments is dangerous.
Commercial airliners look nothing like strategic bombers. If militaries made more of an effort to identify targets before pulling the trigger, these types of situations could be avoided. That would actually take careful consideration and a valuation of non-combatants' lives, but hey it's more fun and easier to just blow stuff up amirite
> If militaries made more of an effort to identify targets
The missile wasn't fired by the Russian military. Instead, Moscow gave some freedom fighters/rebels/terrorists an incredibly-powerful weapon and then failed to supervise them.
Well, the launcher was quite possibly manned by Russian military personnel. Which would make sense, since operating such a weapon requires a professional crew.
> If militaries made more of an effort to identify targets before pulling the trigger, these types of situations could be avoided. That would actually take careful consideration and a valuation of non-combatants' lives, but hey it's more fun and easier to just blow stuff up amirite
They don't, though. This is not a problem unique to the Russian military.
