This week, Facebook is in trouble for hiring a PR firm that spread antisemitic conspiracy theories in order to discredit critics of Facebook. A report in the New York Times claims that due to increasing turmoil extending from criticism about Russian interference on the platform and the Cambridge Analytica scandal, Facebook hired a Republican founded PR company called Definers Public Affairs to help limit its reputational damage. The report goes on to detail how Definers Public Affairs published numerous negative articles about other tech companies on Facebook’s behalf, and pushed the debunked conspiracy theory that many of those expressing criticism about the social network were actually paid operatives that made up a broad anti-Facebook movement being bankrolled by billionaire philanthropist George Soros
Read the rest of this week’s tech news roundup here.