Brexit funder Arron Banks threatens Netflix over Great Hack documentary

[EleanorR]

He's not only threatening Netflix but the journalist (not the paper or publisher, but her personally) who uncovered the truth.

The businessman Arron Banks and the unofficial Brexit campaign Leave.EU have issued a legal threat against streaming giant Netflix in relation to The Great Hack, a new documentary about the Cambridge Analytica scandal and the abuse of personal data.

The threat comes as press freedom campaigners and charity groups warn the government in an open letter that UK courts are being used to “intimidate and silence” journalists working in the public interest.

In a joint letter to key cabinet members, they call for new legislation to stop “vexatious lawsuits”, highlighting one filed last week by Banks against campaigning journalist Carole Cadwalladr.

In addition to Banks’s case against Cadwalladr, the letter also highlights legal threats to Galizia, who at the time of her death faced more than 40 civil lawsuits, many brought by UK-based firms.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jul/20/arron-banks-netflix-threat-great-hack-documentary

[Iggo]

1. Never heard of this doc until today, but now I'm going to watch it. Thanks, Arron Banks!!!

[EleanorR]

2. Showing July 24th!

Premiering on Netflix and in select theaters on July 24, The Great Hack is the most enraging, terrifying and—I don’t use this term lightly—important documentary of the year. Directed by Karim Amer and Jehane Noujaim (The Square), its subject is the Cambridge Analytica data scandal—a story that’s galling on the surface, and infinitely more bone-chilling when one considers its far-reaching ramifications. That’s because Cambridge Analytica’s deceptive and criminal relationship with, and conduct on, Mark Zuckerberg’s social media platform had world-altering consequences: helping launch the Brexit movement, and successfully aiding the election campaign of Donald Trump. It was the opening of Pandora’s Box, and as reporter Paul Hilder opines, “some things get broken and stay broken.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/netflix-takes-aim-at-facebook-with-the-great-hack-an-eye-opening-doc-on-the-cambridge-analytica-scandal

[Brother Buzz]

3. I suspect Netflix is thanking Arron Banks, too

[FakeNoose]

4. If Banks sues for libel then he would have to prove malicious intent

... as well as prove the film contains lies. He would testify in court and answer cross examination questions. I doubt this case would ever get that far. These types of threats are usually made by bullies who can't back up their claims.

[triron]

5. So why hasn't congress called any CA folks to testify????

They had a big hand in fucking with the 2016 election and were tied to the Trump campaign.

[EleanorR]

7. "HOUSE PROBES CAMBRIDGE ANALYTICA ON RUSSIA AND WIKILEAKS"

AS PART OF a sweeping new investigation into what it calls "obstruction of justice, public corruption, and other abuses of power by President Trump," the House Judiciary Committee sent document requests to 81 people and organizations on Monday. The list includes President Trump's sons Donald Jr. and Eric; his son-in-law, Jared Kushner; and a litany of former Trump campaign and administration officials, including former chief strategist Steve Bannon, former chief of staff Reince Priebus, and former communications director Hope Hicks.

Sprinkled among those names are also key players from President Trump's 2016 digital team, including his former digital director and current campaign manager, Brad Parscale, as well as several former executives of Cambridge Analytica, the now defunct consulting company, including former CEO Alexander Nix, former business development director Brittany Kaiser, and Julian Wheatland, director of Cambridge Analytica's parent company, SCL Group. The inclusion of these individuals and the questions asked of them suggest the committee's keen interest in digging for connections between the Trump campaign, Russia, and WikiLeaks, which published Democratic emails that were hacked by Russian state actors during the 2016 election.

“We have sent these document requests in order to begin building the public record," committee chair Jerrold Nadler (D-New York) wrote in a statement announcing the investigation. "This is a critical time for our nation, and we have a responsibility to investigate these matters and hold hearings for the public to have all the facts."

https://www.wired.com/story/congress-democrats-trump-inquiry-cambridge-analytica/

[triron]

10. Thanks but I don't see any former CA folks asked to testify (like Chris Wylie).

[dalton99a]

6. The Great Hack: the film that goes behind the scenes of the Facebook data scandal

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/jul/20/the-great-hack-cambridge-analytica-scandal-facebook-netflix
The Great Hack: the film that goes behind the scenes of the Facebook data scandal

Cambridge Analytica may have become the byword for a scandal, but it’s not entirely clear that anyone knows exactly what that scandal is. It’s more like toxic word association: “Facebook”, “data”, “harvested”, “weaponised”, “Trump” and, in this country, most controversially, “Brexit”.

It was a media firestorm that’s yet to be extinguished, a year on from whistleblower Christopher Wylie’s revelations in the Observer and the New York Times about how the company acquired the personal data of tens of millions of Facebook users in order to target them in political campaigns.

This week sees the release of The Great Hack, a Netflix documentary that is the first feature-length attempt to gather all the strands of the affair into some sort of narrative – though it is one contested even by those appearing in the film.

Even as the US remains in the dark about what happened in 2016, Trump is accelerating towards the next election; Parscale has revealed a war chest of $1bn and is spending $1m a week on Facebook ads.

Cambridge Analytica is dead, but it’s the living dead. Zombie sons of the company live on, including Data Propria, which is now working on the Trump2020 campaign and, most directly, in Emerdata, a company that was set up by Rebekah and Jennifer Mercer, the daughters of Cambridge Analytica’s original owner, Robert Mercer, alongside Alexander Nix and – later – Julian Wheatland (though both men have since resigned).

[blogslut]

8. Trailer

[EleanorR]

9. excellent thanks

That looks terrifying, but I'll be watching on the 24th.