Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), has gotten plenty of publicity over the years. In addition to her leadership at Facebook during a time of massive growth, she’s also become a celebrated author and public speaker. And given the run in FB stock in recent years, she’s clearly earned the accolades.

She’s got one of her most important missions now as far as Facebook stock goes. It’s Sandberg’s moment to reset the narrative around Facebook in Washington. The company keeps going from one scandal to the next. As I discussed recently, the platform came under fire for its overly loose advertising standards. This allowed, among other things, anti-Semitic ads onto the site. Just a month later, more troublesome information about Facebook’s involvement in the election continues to create controversy.

This has led Sandberg to confront the problem head on. She gave an interview this week, the first since the Russia meddling scandal got going, talking about the firm’s role. Sandberg said in no uncertain terms that Facebook failed to live up to its social responsibility. In particular, she stated that: “It’s not just that we apologize. We’re angry, we’re upset. But what we really owe the American people is determination.”

How Serious Was the Russian Meddling?

There are several ways of looking at the Russian ads. On a monetary scale, the ads represent small potatoes. It appears Russia spent only $100,000 or so on disruptive advertising. Trump, by contrast, spent $66 million of his own money on the 2016 campaign. The Russian money thus seems like a minor factor in that sense.

However, the reach of the ads was wide. Facebook estimates that about 10 million Americans saw Russian ads, with around half of this activity occurring before the election. It doesn’t appear to have mattered at all in determining the outcome, given Trump’s significant electoral college victory. Had the vote been a nail-biter like Bush-Gore in 2000, having 10 million folks potentially affected by illegal ads would most certainly have been a major blemish on the democratic process. And we’ll never know for sure what effect the so-called fake news spread through Facebook’s platform had on voters.

Is Facebook likely to get into any trouble for these ads? Facebook has turned over its data on the Russian influence in the election to Congress. That Congressional inquiry is also investigating bad actors on Twitter Inc (NYSE:TWTR) and Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) platforms as well. It appears that Facebook was most compromised; however, the fact that hackers hit other advertising networks as well should take some of the heat off Facebook, at least to a degree.

What Will FB Stock Change Going Forward?

I suggested in my previous article that Facebook will need to become more of a media company to prevent such problems in the future. Incidents such as the anti-Semitic ads could easily have been seen and blocked by a human editor. It will take great advances in AI technology to teach bots to filter out hateful or obscene content successfully.

Sandberg, in her interview this week, stated that Facebook “doesn’t hire journalists” and that they’re a tech company, not a media enterprise. That’s fine. She wants to defend Facebook’s margins. If Facebook does accept the responsibility of keeping bad actors and fake news off its site, it needs more human oversight. Given that Sandberg and other Facebook employees are meeting with politicians, and the company faces a Congressional inquiry on the subject, I understand her unwillingness to admit that the company needs to hire journalists.

However, I doubt the problem is going to go away that easily for Facebook. There are a lot of things politicians will let companies off easily for, but election tampering probably isn’t one of them. If 2020 rolls around and Facebook again serves as a vehicle for foreign actors to manipulate the vote, the company would come under heavy fire. Sandberg is apologizing and showing contrition, but that won’t be enough if another similar breach occurs.

Facebook’s Advertising Advantage

InvestorPlace contributor Vince Martin responded to my previous article with a thoughtful counterargument. He suggested the Facebook stock price will do fine since advertisers don’t really have anywhere else to go. He’s right in that major competitors such as Twitter and Google have their own political scandals related to bad advertising, such as family-friendly brand ads running next to extremist videos on YouTube. Where’s that leave advertisers to go? Other alternatives such as Snap Inc (NYSE:SNAP) that haven’t had political scandals are so small that they don’t reach a significant portion of the public.

Ultimately, companies have to advertise where the eyeballs are. And the fact that observers think Facebook influenced the election meaningfully shows just how powerful its platform is.

The more bullish view for FB stock is that the company can make modest adjustments to its policies sufficient to take the heat off. Martin wrote: “Facebook simply needs to show that it’s trying. Few, if any, users expect the company to eradicate trolls, verify every news story, and judge every advertisement. If the company and the platform are taking constructive steps, that should be enough to keep the user base intact. And that user base still makes Facebook one of the most profitable companies in the world.”

What Does It Mean for FB Stock?

There’s a good chance that this more positive view plays out for FB stock. However, with the stock still near 52-week highs, I’d rather not hold a position heading into a Congressional inquiry. And even if Facebook wins over its doubters in Congress, it still faces a fundamental question.

Is it going to hire more humans to patrol its platform and quash offensive and illegal content, in the process driving down margins? Or will it continue relying on algorithmic solutions, thus remaining a target for motivated hackers? Facebook can come up with a workable solution to this problem, but I don’t see how it will find one that doesn’t hit profits at least moderately.

If I’m right and we’re at peak Facebook profitability per dollar of ad sales, FB stock will struggle to grow at the same rate it has in the past. Even assuming user growth continues rapidly, lower profit margins will hinder the rate of earnings increases. It’s worth asking why CEO Mark Zuckerburg announced that he’ll be selling as much as $12.7 billion in FB stock over the next 18 months. He’s a smart guy. In this case, if I were long FB stock, I’d consider following his example.

At the time of this writing, the author held no positions in any of the aforementioned securities. You can reach him on Twitter at @irbezek.