Fred Vogelstein

In some ways, the world’s largest social network is stronger than ever, with record revenue of $55.8 billion in 2018. But Facebook has also never been more threatened. Here are some dangers that could knock it down.

Michael Cohen, Trump's personal attorney, received four payments totaling $200,000 from AT&T between October 2017 and January 2018. Cohen and AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson entered Trump Tower eight minutes apart on Jan. 12, 2017, according to a pool report at the time. AT&T had two reasons to be keenly interested in Trump's thinking during that period. It, along with other wireless and cable companies, was pushing the Federal Communications Commission to end net neutrality, the rules that bar telecom companies from blocking or favoring certain content.

This is the story of the two years [at Facebook since the runup to the 2016 election], as they played out inside and around the company. Wired spoke with 51 current or former Facebook employees for this article. The stories varied, but most people told the same basic tale: of a company, and a CEO, whose techno-optimism has been crushed as they’ve learned the myriad ways their platform can be used for ill. Of an election that shocked Facebook, even as its fallout put the company under siege.