Facebook's dangerous precedent

Reference: https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2019/10/facebook-permanently-deletes-the-accounts-of-nso-workers/

A red line that should never have been crossed, was just crossed by Facebook.
I'm talking about their response to the NSO group.
NSO group was abusing an exploit in WhatsApp to allow governments (some of them violate human rights) to hack phones of many individuals, including human rights activists.
But I'm not here to talk about NSO. You can say the company is greedy, immoral and evil incarnate, and I would agree. I never worked there and I wouldn't bat an eyelash if tomorrow they went bankrupt.
However, in their response, Facebook has crossed a thick red line: they decided to punish every NSO employee they could find, by blocking them from Facebook, WhatsApp and Instagram.
But they are evil incarnate! They help almighty governments pursue helpless individuals! Nothing wrong about punishing evil company, right?


Except they didn't just punish the company. They punished individual employees.
Some rumors talk about HR girl with thousands of Instagram followers, and talk about spouses of employees, and even ex-employees which didn't even work there at the time.
(No reference at the time, and NSO employees are frightened to admit it is happening. This is coming from people who know employees there).
Does Facebook know which employees knew of their use of WhatsApp?
Do they know who is responsible and who is just an HR recruiter, which sees the company as it tries to sell itself, as 'a company which helps law enforcement in various countries stop terrorists'?
No, they definitely don't know or care.
It gives me chills to think there was employee in Facebook, who was given the task of hunting down NSO employees, in order to carry on Facebook's vengeance.
I can't imagine how he can possibly do it justly.
The most important thing, is that Facebook crossed a red line which was never, in history, crossed by a corporate:
They carried on a personal vendetta of collective punishment against the employees of an entire company.
Let that sink in. This is such a powerful and violent move.
It's a move that tries to send a clear message: if your company messes up with Facebook, they will mess up with your employees.


It's very easy for this message to get lost with all the filth coming from NSO.
It's easy to just dismiss what is happening with the excuse that NSO deserve it. Maybe some of them do.
You're asking yourself: "should we allow Facebook to punish indiscriminately employees of a company I see as evil?"
What you should be asking yourself is: "should we allow Facebook to punish indiscriminately employees of a company Facebook sees as evil?"


Because this is the very first time this is happening with any corporate, the question is so important.
That is the meaning of a precedent:
Is a giant corporate allowed to punish individual employees of another company, as a response to a dispute?
If the answer isn't a resounding NO!, it's not hard to imagine where this will lead to next.
And when we get there, down the line, if we do not stop it right here and now, but allow this to continue, there will always be the question: "Why did you agree when they did it the first time?"
"They did it to an evil company", will not be a sufficient explanation.

If we don't stop this now, it's not hard to see the slippery slope:
Next, they will threaten any security company which has vulnerabilities, to withhold their report or the entire company employee base will be punished.
This will of course be implicit, and someone will ignore it, and they will punish their employees. And they will say, 'this isn't even the first time - we did it before!'
Then they can do it to employees of companies which are in legal patent dispute. This won't be the first time, and Facebook will definitely see that company as evil.
Then, eventually, everyone will be afraid to join companies which upset Facebook, because you don't want the big bully to touch you.
This can even reach beyond Facebook. If we don't stop this frightening precedent right now, other corporate can follow.
Google can decide to delete every employee google account, as a result of some dispute in the App Store.
Amazon might decide to ban you from buying from them, if your company happened to violate one of their endless rules.


If this is not stopped right here and now, this can lead to an all out corporate war.
This issue is so much bigger than NSO.
Corporations, and Facebook most of all, are professional at slowly eroding boundaries.
It always starts with a soft and easy 'evil' target, like NSO.
But once you open the gate, there's no going back.


In fact, it is this very essence of evil that comes from NSO in the first place.
It starts with helping governments tracking down evil terrorists.
But it goes on and ends with incredibly powerful organization, punishing and attacking individuals, such as human rights advocates, just because they belong in some group.
It always starts with an evil group, but once you allow an all powerful organization to attack individuals in groups it doesn't like, NSO is a nice example of where you will end.
And Facebook is just beginning.


There were only three kinds of organizations, who think it is legitimate to attack employees / workers in enemy organization collectively as a way to resolve a dispute:
Governments, crime organizations and terror organizations. You can add Facebook to this honorable list. This is the first time in history a corporate acts this way.
There's a reason there is a law against crime organizations. Their practice of individual vendetta endangers innocents, because it is inaccurate, just like Facebook banned some spouses of employees.


It's not a coincidence Facebook allows itself to act this way. They are used to moderating and censoring. They already see themselves as judges, at least to individual actions.
They already see themselves as some kind of court of law. Now they just extended their judgement to companies. Their punishment? collective punishment to all employees. Not even the real law is so harsh. This isn't justice.
Why should Facebook bother waiting for the real courts to decide? They can punish NSO themselves right here and now!
It is better left unsaid what would happen if NSO would do the same to Facebook employees.
Or what an anarchy we would live in if every single corporation would punish employees of other corporation over a dispute, to the best of its ability.


TL;DR, what do I want? To draw a clear boundary: It is immoral, and should be illegal, for a corporation to individually punish an enemy company employees, just because they happened to work there.
This boundary must be communicated to Facebook as firmly as possible, and to any overlooking corporation who might think of trying the same.
This boundary was left unsaid and untouched, almost an unspoken rule, but apparently Facebook decided to cross it and see what happens.
What should happen is outstanding outrage from every single employee of a technological company, because we all can be next.


P.S. I am posting this anonymously, from justified fear of Facebook. I do not use Facebook itself, but if they touch my WhatsApp I'm in so much trouble. It's irreplaceable to me right now.
I give permission to whoever sees this and can expand the audience to use this as he sees fit.