Facebook's regulation fail in Ukraine should worry Europe | Politico Opinion - Jankowicz | (May 2019)

For years, Ukraine has been a playground where Russia tests its abilities to interfere in elections -- whether through hacking or influence campaigns. Last month's presidential election was no exception: The high-stakes campaign became a test of Facebook's commitment to protect elections from foreign and domestic disinformation.

The Silicon Valley tech giant failed -- badly.

The company's patchy protection of the Ukrainian vote should be a wake-up call to Europe as its lawmakers grapple with how to guard against misinformation ahead of the European Parliament election later this month. It indicates that, despite Facebook's  self-reported progress fighting election interference, the tech giant's efforts are still falling short.

Ukraine's new president-elect, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, beat incumbent Petro Poroshenko in a dirty race in which Facebook's lax monitoring of political advertising allowed disinformation to run rampant.

Among the Facebook pages that spread spurious claims during the election was one with more than 100,000 followers that ran a video claiming Zelenskiy will allow Russia to take over the country with a violent military operation. Others portrayed him as a drug addict, or Poroshenko as an alcoholic. One Facebook page posted a digitally edited picture of a Ukrainian rock star holding an anti-Poroshenko sign, when the musician had in fact been denouncing Zelenskiy.

Pandora Papers Reveal Offshore Holdings of Ukrainian President and his Inner Circle | OCCRP - Oct 3, 2021 |

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky rode to power on pledges to clean up the Eastern European country, but the Pandora Papers reveal he and his close circle were the beneficiaries of a network of offshore companies, including some that owned expensive London property.

'Sapere aude'