Inside a counterfeit Facebook farm

By News on the Net —— Bio and Archives June 16, 2015

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EVERY MORNING, KIM Casipong strolls past barbed wire, six dogs, and a watchman in order to get to her job in a pink apartment building high above the slums in Lapu-Lapu City, Philippines. She is a pretty, milk-skinned, 17-year-old girl who loves the movie Frozen and whose favorite pastime is singing karaoke. She is on her way to do her part in bringing down Facebook.

Casipong huffs to the third floor, opens a door decorated with a crucifix, and greets her co-workers. The curtains are drawn, and the artificial moonlight of computer screens illuminates the room. Eight workers sit in two rows, their tools arranged on their desks: a computer, a minaret of cellphone SIM cards, and an old cellphone. Tens of thousands of additional SIM cards are taped into bricks and stored under chairs, on top of computers, and in old instant-noodle boxes around the room. Richard Braggs, Casipong's boss, sits at a desk positioned behind his employees, occasionally glancing up from his double monitor to survey their screens. The Week...