Facebook board member and billionaire investor Peter Thiel has reportedly extended his influence over CEO Mark Zuckerberg and was key in the controversial decision to continue accepting political ads ahead of the 2020 election and to not fact-check them.

Six of Silicon Valley’s biggest companies had a combined “tax gap” of more than $100 billion this decade, according to a new analysis. Fair Tax Mark, a British organization that certifies businesses for good tax conduct, assessed global tax payments from Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google and Microsoft between 2010 and 2019. The companies are sometimes collectively referred to as the “Silicon Six.”

The Cyberspace Administration of China issued a new policy Friday designed to prevent the spread of fake news and misleading edited imagery and video, known as deepfakes. The new policy criminalizes the publication of such content with proper disclosure that it is indeed fake.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg flirted with the idea of getting into the online dating business in 2014 — but instead gave Tinder and similar apps access to user data, leaked documents show.

The company’s anticompetitive behavior is rooted in a deep sense of fear that it’s vulnerable to rivals.

Facebook has fought vigorously against the release of the documents, arguing that they presented an unbalanced picture of the company.

The transformation of Facebook is complete. Facebook, a social network originally founded as an Ivy League version of Hot or Not, has billions of users and the power to sway elections. In the U.S., where nearly 70 percent of adults are Facebook users, its recent choices make it clear where the company stands: with the party of Donald Trump.

As the tech industry transforms into a hotbed of employee dissent, Facebook employees have remained on the sidelines. Are they finally having their moment?

Trying to build trust with one hand, and chipping away at it with the other. If you missed the first-ever Interface Live last week, I hope you’ll consider come seeing me this week! I’ll be talking with Clara Tsao, a researcher and entrepreneur who focuses on disinformation and platforms, at a free event in San Francisco. It’s on Tuesday at 6:30 p.m., and I would love to see you there. The event is free, and you can RSVP here.

Facebook is giving Breitbart News, the self-proclaimed platform for the alt-right, a prized space in its new 'high quality' news section on the app.

Mark Zuckerberg hopes that one day, in the not too distant future, billions of people will use a cryptocurrency created by Facebook to send money to friends and family around the world. Mr. Zuckerberg also recognizes that his company is a major impediment to that vision.

Facebook no longer ranks among the world's 10 most valuable brands, according to branding consultancy Interbrand, a sign the repeated blows to the social media company's reputation in recent years is taking a toll. Facebook fell to No. 14 in Interbrand's annual ranking of "best global brands," released this week. Just two years ago, the company was No. 8 on the list and was singled out as a "rapidly appreciating" brand.

In case it wasn't clear already, Mark Zuckerberg really isn't a fan of TikTok. During a speech at Georgetown University, the Facebook CEO had some forceful criticism for rival app TikTok, which is owned by Chinese company ByteDance. "While our services, like WhatsApp, are used by protesters and activists everywhere due to strong encryption and privacy protections, on TikTok, the Chinese app growing quickly around the world, mentions of these protests are censored, even in the U.S.," Zuckerberg said. "Is that the internet we want?"

Blizzard has cancelled a launch event for Overwatch on the Nintendo Switch, just seven days after it first announced the celebration. The free event was scheduled to take place tomorrow on October 16 at New York's Nintendo Store. The first 150 fans to sign up were promised meet-and-greets with voice actors from the game, and the only requirement to attend was an active Nintendo account.

Welcome new subscribers! Today we celebrate The Interface’s second birthday. For two years now, we’ve done our best to bring you the day’s most important developments in technology and democracy. The next year, which will bring us a US presidential election, promises to be the most consequential yet. Thank you for reading it and sharing with your friends and coworkers. And if you’re in San Francisco and would like to meet us in person, there are still some tickets available for our first-ever live event on Tuesday, October 22nd: my conversation with the brilliant disinformation researcher Renee DiResta. I hope to see you there!

You're not alone if you think social networks are degrading the quality of news. A Pew study indicates that 62 percent of American adults believe social media companies have "too much control" over news, and 55 percent believe these companies have created a "worse mix" of news through their feed algorithms and other editorial choices. Not surprisingly, the survey respondents pinned it on the quality of the news that surfaced in their social streams.

Living with regret. Lori Loughlin is finally grasping the seriousness of her situation, and is angry with husband Mossimo Giannulli after he recommended they reject the plea deal prosecutors offered in April, a source exclusively reveals to Us Weekly.

The U.S. Catholic Church spent more than $10 million on lobbyists over seven years to delay statute of limitations reforms from going into effect in eight states, according to a new report.

Consumers continue to risk being ripped off as a result of fake review “factories” on Facebook that manufacture misleading Amazon product reviews, says Which? It told Guardian Money that “nearly all” of the Facebook groups it uncovered last autumn were still active this month.

In the latest example of an alleged criminal relying on God only after it’s far too late to do the right thing, Lori Loughlin (a.k.a. Full House‘s Aunt Becky) is relying on faith to get her through the college admissions scandal. Loughlin and her husband Mossimo Giannulli have been accused of paying $500,000 to have their daughters Olivia Jade and Isabella Rose get into college as crew team recruits… despite the fact that the girls had never competitively rowed.