Facebook says they are doing an experiment to see how their platform affects elections. According to the New York Post, Facebook will pay users up to $120 to shut down their accounts for a few weeks.
Users have reported getting notifications from Facebook asking if they would accept cash in exchange for shutting down their Facebook accounts for $10, $15, or $20 a week in the final weeks of the election cycle. Screenshots of these notifications popped up on Twitter asking users if they would accept cash.
Facebook spokesperson Liz Bourgeois has confirmed that Facebook is performing this experiment. “This is fairly standard for this type of academic research,” she said on Twitter.
Facebook expects 200,000-400,000 adults to participate in the study.