Tag: Big Tech

Sen. Blackburn Calls for More Boots of the Southern Border, Closer Look at Big Tech Business Practices

Jason M. Reynolds

  U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) is gaining attention for her strong stands on border security and “big tech.” On Saturday, she joined Fox News’ Neil Cavuto on “Cavuto Live” to discuss her trip to the border in El Paso, Texas, Friday to meet with Customs and Border Patrol officials. Blackburn also discussed how Congress should assess the size of big tech companies.   ‘Big tech’ Cavuto called it “an odd confluence of events” to have many Republicans and Democrats agreeing on a subject — the need to watch “big tech.” Regarding “big tech,” Blackburn, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said “They are big ad companies. They have pretty much built monopolies in their space and it is time to review their practices and see how much we know about what they are doing with, as I call it, your Virtual You – you and your presence online.” Congress needs to “do a deep dive” and examine the companies’ business practices before making any sort of recommendations to the Department of Justice, Blackburn said. In April, Blackburn said tech companies should embrace “the spirit of the First Amendment,” The Tennessee Star reported. She called out media giants to…

Read the full story

Report: Trump’s DOJ Prepares an Antitrust Investigation into Google’s Business Practice

Admin

by Chris White   The Department of Justice is preparing an antitrust probe against Google’s search engine and business model, The Wall Street Journal reported Friday night, citing people familiar with the issue. It would be the first such investigation since the Federal Trade Commission conducted a probe of Google but closed it in 2013 without taking action. The FTC and DOJ have discussed which agency would oversee a probe of the internet giant — the commission agreed to give DOJ officials jurisdiction, TheWSJ noted. The Trump administration is focusing its attention on Google’s business model related to the company’s search. Google and the DOJ have not responded to The Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment. The FTC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Investigating Google was in some ways a long time in the making. Conservatives and liberals have become increasingly critical of big tech. Facebook was scrutinized after Russia used its platform to intervene in American politics. Lawmakers are also unsure about the companies assurances that they are careful handling private data. Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, for instance, proposed a bill in May that would essentially block tech companies from tracking people’s locations without direct…

Read the full story

Commentary: Mainstream Media’s Agitprop Distorts Trump’s Actions to Help Protect Trillions in Crony Globalist Status Quo

Admin

by Edward Ring   Competing investigations and alternative analyses offer partisans on both sides ample fodder to feed their biases, but a presumption that guilt can be manufactured if it doesn’t exist is the common thread pushing them. Just as the Soviets knew in Stalinist Russia, if you look at anyone long enough, you’re going to find something to use against them. Instead of dispatching political opponents with bullets to the back of the head, however, we Americans fight with politicized investigations, attorneys, and political grandstanding. And on the side of America’s anti-Trump shadow government, deep state, establishment bureaucracy, the media closes ranks and takes every opportunity to distort the truth in favor of an agenda. Recent reporting provides yet another example of the establishment media’s Stalinesque anti-Trump bias. President Trump on Wednesday canceled a meeting to discuss infrastructure legislation with House leadership, because immediately prior to the meeting, he was blindsided by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) holding a meeting with pro-impeachment lawmakers, where she “emphasized that the White House is engaging in a ‘cover-up’.” Some news accounts suggest that Trump planned to cancel the meeting and hold a press conference instead, based on the fact that a “no collusion, no obstruction” sign had been…

Read the full story

Commentary: The Dawn Of Corporate Totalitarianism

Admin

by George Rasley   In a dystopian future envisioned by some of science fiction’s greatest authors, mankind is ruled not by elected leaders or by warlords who came to power through victory in battle. Instead, humans have become the virtual slaves of soulless totalitarian corporations that vie with each other for control of resources and populations. If you think that bizarre form of fascism is impossible or so unlikely to succeed that you don’t have to worry about it consider the following developments from the past few months. Facebook, the world’s largest social media “platform” has permanently banned a group of ostensibly conservative writers and thinkers it has labeled purveyors of “hate” and “dangerous individuals.” Among those banned are Alex Jones, host of InfoWars, its UK editor Paul Joseph Watson, ex-Breitbart News editor Milo Yiannopoulos, former Republican congressional candidate Paul Nehlen, and independent journalist Laura Loomer. Keep in mind none of these individuals have killed anyone, threatened to kill someone or committed any crime of incitement or assault – it is their ideas, not their actions that are deemed to be “dangerous” by Facebook dictator Mark Zuckerberg. Not only are those individuals banned, but any reference to them or links to…

Read the full story

Blackburn Calls on Tech Giants to Embrace First Amendment and Use Their Powers Responsibly

Jason M. Reynolds

“Its time for tech companies like Google and Facebook to start embracing the spirit of the First Amendment,” U.S. Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. The senator made the remarks during a hearing titled, “Stifling Free Speech: Technological Censorship and the Public Discourse.” Video of Blackburn’s remarks may be watched here. Blackburn called out media giants to use their power responsibly and to respect diverse viewpoints, particularly conservative voices. She tweeted, “Big Tech shouldn’t censor stories and posts in our newsfeeds. Let free speech flourish. My full questions at the @senjudiciary hearing on censorship:”. Big Tech shouldn't censor stories and posts in our newsfeeds. Let free speech flourish. My full questions at the @senjudiciary hearing on censorship: https://t.co/asy2FRD16S — Sen. Marsha Blackburn (@MarshaBlackburn) April 10, 2019 Blackburn also on Wednesday introduced SB1116, the Balancing the Rights of Web Surfers Equally and Responsibly (BROWSER) Act, she said in a press release. The BROWSER Act requires communications and technology companies to provide users with clear and conspicuous notice of their privacy policies and the ability to opt-in to the collection of sensitive information and to opt-out of the collection of non-sensitive information. It also prohibits these companies…

Read the full story

Conservatives Call for Tech Giants to Split Ties with SPLC

Admin

by Jarrett Stepman   Silicon Valley has enormous power over the flow of information that reaches people around the globe. That’s why it’s vital for Americans to understand how tech giants can manipulate information, either intentionally or unwittingly, to advance a political agenda. Now, 34 conservative leaders are banding together to call for tech giants Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, and Google to “cut ties” with the Southern Poverty Law Center. The letter states in part, “It is now clear that the SPLC has proven to be a hate-filled, anti-Christian, anti-conservative organization and nothing more than a weapon of the radical Left, whose goal is to bully people into compliance with their ideology.” [ The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more ] As we’ve discussed on previous episodes of “Media Misses,” the SPLC is a far-left civil rights organization that has made wild claims about conservative organizations over the years, lumping them in with hate groups like neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan. It has come under scrutiny after its founder, Morris Dees, resigned over accusations of discrimination and improper behavior. The issue has garnered the attention of those in Congress as…

Read the full story

Facebook Reveals How It Ranks Items in the News Feed

Admin

Reuters   Facebook is lifting the lid on the algorithm that decides which posts appear in its news feed, as part of a drive to be more transparent and offer greater control to users. The feature “Why am I seeing this post?”, being rolled out from Monday, offers some insight into the tens of thousands of inputs used by the social network to rank stories, photos and video in the news feed, the foundation of the platform. “The basic thing that this tool does is let people see why they are seeing a particular post in their news feed, and it helps them access the actions they might want to take if they want to change that,” Facebook’s Head of News Feed John Hegeman told reporters on Monday. After a series of privacy scandals, Facebook needs to regain users’ trust as it prepares to roll out a single messaging service combining Facebook messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram that could make it even more central to users’ communications. The new news feed feature will show users the data that connect them to a particular type of post, Hegeman said, for example that they are friends with the poster and they’ve liked their…

Read the full story

Commentary: Healthcare Will Follow the Dangerous Politicization of Big Tech

Admin

by Tho Bishop   As tech executives continue to be grilled in front of Congress, the growing Bernie Sanders-wing of the Democratic Party is preparing to push its misnamed “Medicare for All” into the political mainstream after its political gains in the midterms. While these two stories seem to have very little in common, it’s not difficult to imagine a not-so-distant future where the two are dangerously connected. After all, so long as the scope of government grows, the continued politicization of all aspect of life will follow – the inevitable consequences of which could be quite horrific. The State’s Shadow over Silicon Valley First let’s consider some of the overlooked causes behind the increased censorship from Silicon Valley. While Republican politicians relish in collecting cheap soundbites railing against the censorship practices of widely despised tech executives, few are willing to point out the obvious influence of government in Big Tech’s growing hostility to free speech. For example, just recently Facebook announced it was following the lead of Tumblr by cracking down on “sexualized content” on its platform. While both decisions were widely ridiculed by users and pundits alike, largely ignored was the role that recent Congressional laws aimed at…

Read the full story

New Documentary Shows Viewers the Power of Tech Giants

Admin

by Ryan McMaken   The Creepy Line, a new documentary by director M.A. Taylor, is now streaming at Amazon Prime. It provides an interesting and revealing look at how Google and Facebook influence their users’ view of the world, and how the users we often presume to be the customers of these companies aren’t really the customers. The users are, in fact, the product being sold to third parties. The Creepy Line takes its title from a description of Google once uttered by Google executive Eric Schmidt who said Google’s mission was to “get right up to the creepy line and not cross it.” In truth, though, by pioneering the “surveillance business model,” Google has arguably been stepping over “the creepy line” for years. Not that this has been much of a problem for the company. Few users seem motivated to stop using Google products. It is perhaps in its basic explanations of how this surveillance model works that The Creepy Line is most interesting: the filmmakers explain in simple terms how a small number of companies have come to compile extensive data profiles of many hundreds of millions of human beings, and how that user data is the real…

Read the full story

Google CEO to Testify Before Congress to Discuss Allegations of Conservative Censorship

Admin

by Evie Fordham   Google CEO Sundar Pichai will testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Dec. 5 to answer questions about the company’s possible political bias, the committee announced. “Americans put their trust in big tech companies to honor freedom of speech and champion open dialogue, and it is Congress’ responsibility to the American people to make sure these tech giants are transparent and accountable in their practices,” committee chairman Rep. Bob Goodlatte, a Virginia Republican, said in a committee press release. Republican lawmakers criticized Pichai for skipping a Sept. 5 Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on social media and foreign election meddling. Facebook and Twitter executives testified, and an empty chair with a nameplate that said “Google” sat where the company’s representative would have been. The announcement of the social media-focused hearing comes as Google employees are making headlines for a Tuesday open letter protesting the company’s work on a censored Chinese search engine. “Today the company accounts for nearly 90 percent of worldwide search traffic. … Unfortunately, recent reports suggest Google might not be wielding its vast power impartially,” committee member and House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy said in the press release. “Its business practices may have been affected by political bias. Additionally, reports claim the company is…

Read the full story

Commentary: Aided By Big Tech and Media, the Far Left is Organizing for More Political Assassinations

Admin
Attacking Trump supporters

by George Rasley   Just in case you bought the establishment media’s narrative that the attempted assassination of House Republican Whip Rep. Steve Scalise and the rest of the Republican baseball team was the one-off work of a nut, our friends at Far Left Watch have a chilling report to once and for all disabuse you of that fantasy. They report that the co-host of the far-left podcast, The Guillotine, recently took to Twitter to brainstorm with his 5K+ followers about the best way to organize an armed insurrection “Dr. Bones” (@Ole_Bonsey) asked “Hey quick little question for military minded lefties: should leftists train/organize in a “insurgent” focus where they blend into a civilian population for potential attacks or a more “militia” structure focused on holding/maintaining turf?” According to Far Left Watch, The Guillotine covers “global current events from a revolutionary anarchist and communist perspective”. They have a large social media footprint for a relatively new podcast. They currently have over 5k Twitter followers, over 14K Facebook followers and 250 active monthly donors on their Patreon account. The two co-hosts, @Ole_Bonsey and @DeadIrishRebel self identify as an “egoist-Communist” and “Marxist” respectively and based on the activity on their social media accounts…

Read the full story

Analysis: California’s Bill Establishing the ‘Internet Social Media Advisory Group’ Could Run Afoul of the First Amendment

Admin

California is one step away from going down the unconstitutional road of government-mandated censorship of Internet speech. The California Senate and State Assembly recently passed S.B. 1424, the “Internet: social media: advisory group” act. This fake news advisory act is now on the desk of Governor Jerry Brown for his signature. According to Section 3085 of the legislation: The Attorney General shall, subject to the limitations of subdivision (d), establish an advisory group consisting of at least one member of the Department of Justice, Internet-based social media providers, civil liberties advocates, and First Amendment scholars, to do both of the following: (a) Study the problem of the spread of false information through Internet-based social media platforms. (b) Draft a model strategic plan for Internet-based social media platforms to use to mitigate the spread of false information through their platforms. It’s hard to imagine those voting for the bill were motivated by good intentions. In any case, good intentions are not enough. Is it hard to imagine the results of the law will be censorship of views that politicians disagree with and views critical of politicians? Most likely, Californians are not concerned about “fact-checking” content like “a mile is 5290 feet” or an appeal to…

Read the full story

Republican Rep. Gaetz Threatens Twitter with FEC Complaint Over Twitter Suppression, Claims Twitter May Be Giving Opponent Illegal Advantage

Admin
Matt Gaetz

by Peter Hasson and Joe Simonson    – Twitter’s recent algorithm change suppressed, or “shadow-banned,” prominent conservatives, including Republican Florida Rep. Matt Gaetz, a new report found.  – Gaetz is considering filing a Federal Election Commission (FEC) complaint against Twitter, he told The Daily Caller News Foundation.  – Gaetz said his Twitter account’s growth slowed immediately after Twitter’s recent algorithm change. Twitter acknowledged the “inaccurate” search results but said it was unrelated to politics. Rep. Matt Gaetz is considering filing a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) over Twitter’s alleged suppression of his account, the Florida Republican told The Daily Caller News Foundation on Wednesday. Gaetz was one of several prominent conservatives, including members of Congress and the chair of the Republican National Committee, whose accounts Twitter suppressed by making it harder to find in the site’s search function, a Vice News investigation published Wednesday found. “Democrats are not being ‘shadow banned’ in the same way,” the report concluded, noting: “Not a single member of the 78-person Progressive Caucus faces the same situation in Twitter’s search.” Twitter announced in May that the company would rely on “behavior-based signals” to boost the visibility of some accounts and to suppress the visibility of others, as…

Read the full story

California Congresswoman Says There’s No Bias Against Conservatives In Tech – Here’s Why She’s Wrong

Admin
Zoe Lofgren

by Kyle Perisic   A Democratic congresswoman said on Tuesday that conservatives and Republicans’ concerns over bias on the Facebook, Google, and Twitter platforms are unjustified. Here’s proof she’s wrong. Democratic Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California said at a hearing addressing political discrimination against conservatives and Republicans on Facebook, Google, and Twitter, which dominant Internet traffic, is “motivated by a sense of persecution, on the part of Republicans and conservatives that somehow they’re being unfairly treated when they have a majority in House, the Senate, the White House.” Despite the hearing specifically addressing discrimination against conservatives on the Facebook, Google, and Twitter platforms — not on their conservative news sites — Lofgren brought up “conservative news sites have three times more user engagement that liberals do.” “There’s been no evidence whatsoever that I have seen and that the majority has been able to provide that there’s any bias whatsoever,” she added. YouTube, a subsidiary of Google’s parent company Alphabet, admitted in March it “may misapply some of our policies resulting in mistaken removals,” which in this case involved a number of conservative channels being removed from the platform, The Daily Caller News Foundation reported. Additionally, Google, utilizing Wikipedia, mislabeled a Republican candidate…

Read the full story

For Those Who Want A New Facebook: Privacy Advocates Fed Up With The Tech Giant Are Launching Their Own Social Media Platform

Admin
Openbook social media

by Eric Lieberman   Cybersecurity and privacy experts are currently in the process of trying to rival Facebook by starting their own social media platform. With a fundraising page set to launch Tuesday, the “open source” social network called Openbook is aimed at “helping make the world a better place,” a similar overarching objective to that of Facebook. The professed difference is that Openbook will be “privacy-friendly” in which it won’t monitor or track users. “Surf the network with absolute peace of mind!” the start-up’s site says. Many avid users of social media, including the ones who find fault with Facebook and accuse it of not caring how user data is utilized, even manipulated, are often reluctant to try to find an alternative to Facebook because of its apparent ubiquitousness. They worry, in other words, that jumping ship to another platform is mostly pointless because not enough people will follow — seemingly not considering the fundamental principles behind a movement or protest. But Openbook, which was founded in The Hague, Netherlands in April 2018, appears to have a solution by allowing users to import all photos, videos, chat logs, and other content and communications, into its platform via a “drag-and-drop” feature. While there appears to be no direct mention of…

Read the full story

Commentary: Time To Make Facebook Pay For Its Lies

Admin

by George Rasley   Conservatives who have suffered discrimination from tech billionaire Mark Zuckerberg’s Facebook will derive a little bit of pleasure from recent disclosures the company made in a small courtroom in Redwood City, California. According to reporting in the UK’s Guardian, Facebook has long had the same public response when questioned about its disruption of the news industry: it is a tech platform, not a publisher or a media company. But on Monday, the Guardian reports attorneys for the social media company presented a different message from the one executives have made to Congress, in interviews and in speeches: Facebook, they repeatedly argued, is a publisher, and a company that makes editorial decisions, which are protected by the First Amendment. As the Guardian pointed out, questions about Facebook’s moral and legal responsibilities as a publisher have escalated surrounding its role in spreading false news and propaganda, along with questionable censorship decisions. The plaintiff, as the Guardian explained, is a former startup called Six4Three, first filed the suit in 2015 after Facebook removed app developers’ access to friends’ data. The company had built a controversial and ultimately failed app called Pikinis, which allowed people to filter photos to find ones with people in bikinis and other swimwear. Six4Three attorneys have alleged that Facebook enticed developers to create apps for its platform by…

Read the full story

Commentary: Should Congress Break Social Media’s Stranglehold on Free Speech?

Admin
US Capitol at night

by Jeffery Rendall   Strolling towards the capitol on one of our recent trips to Williamsburg, Virginia, a thought struck me as we neared the reconstructed building; so much went on inside those walls but the people in the street had nary a clue about what was happening at the time. Sure, there were three newspapers in town (in the late 18th century), but they were somewhat crude enterprises by today’s standards, receiving and reprinting tidbits of intelligence from townspeople, passers through, other newspapers and let’s face it – plain gossip and hearsay. Just steps away great men were debating and deciding everyone’s future yet few common folk understood what was taking place except for what the men – or the royal governor and his council – chose to divulge. Not even the town crier was much help in this regard. Fast forward to today when practically everything that’s “official” is a matter of public record. Granted the government and its agents still keep plenty of secrets – the fallout from the Mueller investigation certainly revealed it – but we know a lot more than the Virginians of the 1760’s and 70’s did. Heck, they were about to sever ties with the…

Read the full story

Microsoft Confirms It is Acquiring GitHub for $7.5 Billion

Admin
Microsoft Github

Microsoft on Monday said it will buy software development platform GitHub, in a deal worth $7.5 billion which will blend two opposite corporate cultures. The tech giant, based in Washington state, is a heavyweight in terms of software whose source codes are not openly available or modifiable, exactly the counter of GitHub’s philosophy. Created in 2008, GitHub allows developers to cooperatively manage software and has more than 28 million users around the world. “Microsoft is a developer-first company, and by joining forces with GitHub we strengthen our commitment to developer freedom, openness and innovation,” Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella said in a statement. “We recognize the community responsibility we take on with this agreement and will do our best work to empower every developer to build, innovate and solve the world’s most pressing challenges.” The veteran tech firm said it “will acquire GitHub for $7.5 billion in Microsoft stock.” Subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory review, the deal is expected to be finalized by the end of the year, Microsoft said in a statement on its website. “GitHub will retain its developer-first ethos and will operate independently to provide an open platform for all developers in all industries,” Microsoft…

Read the full story

Google Withdraws As Host Of Democratic Fundraising Event

Admin
Google withdraws from Dem Fundraiser

by Eric Lieberman   Google was set to rent out its D.C. headquarters to a progressive group running a fundraiser for top Senate Democrats, but canceled it Friday just days before. The group “Run For Something” cultivates up-and-coming Democrats for all levels of government. Its event, “Party For Something,” was supposed to occur June 6 at a location only disclosed if tickets ($100 to $1,000) were purchased. “Important note! Confirmation of the date, time, and venue will be in your donation receipt,” reads the website, which also says “Location available upon RSVP” elsewhere. “No need to print anything; just check in with ID when you arrive.” The venue likely shows up as something different now since Google confirmed to The Daily Caller News Foundation that the event was occurring at its offices in the nation’s capital, and subsequently that it was canceled since leadership had allegedly just become aware. “June 6th: Games, drinks and building the bench with Senators Elizabeth Warren, Kirsten Gillibrand & Cory Booker!!” the invite states at the top. “Why? Because Run For Something set a goal of recruiting 50,000 new voices this year to run for office — and you want to help make it happen.” Google representatives declined…

Read the full story

Facebook’s Political Ad Rules Seem To Be Already Causing Problems

Admin
Facebook privacy concerns

by Eric Lieberman   A professor was recently unable to promote a podcast on Facebook that delved into Russians’ perspective of President Donald Trump because it was deemed to fall under the tech company’s new rules against political advertising. Sean Guillory, a scholar with a doctoral degree from UCLA, is the digital scholarship curator at the University of Pittsburgh’s Center for Russian and East European Studies. In his podcast episode published Saturday called “Russians on Trump,” Guillory interviewed another expert Laurence Bogoslaw, who has established a collective resource for translated Russian news coverage of Trump. Knowing very well how hot of a topic the president, the foreign adversary and alleged connections between the two are, Guillory wanted to promote the dialogue. Facebook denied his request to purchase an ad slot for the podcast. Eventually, after an appeal, the tech giant explained that it regards Guillory’s interview as political content, meaning there would be greater scrutiny and a potentially higher cost for sponsorship. “This is the crux of the problem: What is ‘political’?” Guillory told The Daily Caller News Foundation. “I see my podcast as educational in that its mission is to interview people who have some expert knowledge about Eurasia’s politics, culture and…

Read the full story

Facebook Faces Class-Action Lawsuit For Collecting Texts, Phone Call Data

Admin

by Kyle Perisic   Facebook is facing a class-action lawsuit following revelations it collects text messages and phone calls via its smartphone apps on Android devices. The social network giant’s actions “presents several wrongs, including a consumer bait-and-switch, an invasion of privacy, wrongful monitoring of minors and potential attacks on privileged communications” such as those between attorneys and clients or doctors and patients, the lawsuit alleges. “Facebook has collected and stored information in a scope and manner beyond that which users knowingly authorized. The practice is ongoing” on the Android version of the Facebook apps, according to the lawsuit. “This activity includes assessing users’ call and text histories (including metadata such as the names and number of persons contacted), the times of such contacts, and the lengths of such contacts,” the lawsuit shows. The extent of Facebook’s data collection activity was brought to light when it was revealed in March Cambridge Analytica, a tech consulting firm, had sold Facebook users’ data to President Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. Former President Barack Obama also used Facebook users’ data in his 2012 campaign. (RELATED: Obama Staffer: Facebook Knew Presidential Campaign Improperly Seized Data, Looked the Other Way) Facebook began collecting the texts and phone call information before…

Read the full story

Six of the Best Exchanges in Social Media Hearing With Diamond and Silk

Admin

by Rachel del Guidice   Conservative social media personalities Diamond and Silk, who say Facebook has censored their page, were front and center at a congressional hearing Thursday on the content-filtering practices of social media platforms. “Shame on the ones that don’t even see that we have been censored, yet when the Black Lives Matter people complain about it—oh, everybody is up in arms,” Lynnette “Diamond” Hardaway said Thursday at a House Judiciary Committee hearing. Hardaway appears regularly in videos on the social media site Diamond and Silk with her real-life sister, Rochelle “Silk” Richardson. “Let me just say this here: If the shoe was on the other foot, and Mark Zuckerberg was a conservative, and we were liberals—oh, fences and chains would have broke loose,” Hardaway said of the Facebook CEO. “You know it, and I know it.” [ The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more ] Twitter declined The Daily Signal’s request for comment, but Facebook said that it’s standing by remarks made by Zuckerberg, when he testified April 10 and 11 on Capitol Hill about the company’s practices. “As Mark stated during his testimony in front…

Read the full story

Facebook Wants To Exclude 1.5 Billion Users From Privacy Rules It Seems To Consider Overbearing

Admin

by Eric Lieberman   Facebook is planning on adapting to imminently enforced rules from the European Union by trying to exclude around 1.5 billion users from other places around the world. All users of the social media platform outside of the U.S. and Canada are subjected to the same rules, specifically those enacted and enforced by the company’s headquarters in Ireland, according to Reuters, which was the first to report on Facebook’s apparent intentions. Facebook wants to carve out the implementation of the E.U.’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) — a relatively stringent privacy law set to take effect May 25, 2018 that will govern internet and technology — to those in Europe. In other words, it wants to exempt itself from imposing the GDPR on the roughly 1.5 billion Facebook members in Australia, Asia, Africa and Latina America, since they are not confined by the same rules as the involved European countries. Some, of course, will view such a move as a way to elude liability for the way it handles user data, a huge point of contention that arose after a series of recent events and revelations. It could also be perceived as a way to ensure people outside the jurisdiction of the European…

Read the full story

Joe Carter Commentary: What You Should Know About Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s Senate Hearings

Admin

by Joe Carter   What just happened? On Tuesday, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg gave testimony (though not officially under oath) before a joint hearing of the Senate Judiciary and Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation committees. On Wednesday, Zuckerberg testified at a second hearing before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He was asked to appear before Congress to discuss such issues as data privacy and Russian use of his social network to meddle in the 2016 election. Why is Facebook and Zuckerberg now under scrutiny? Facebook has been at the center of recent data privacy scandals and concerns. The Senate hearings were particularly interested in learning about the connection between Facebook and Cambridge Analytica. Last month the New York Times reported that British data analysis firm Cambridge Analytica had “harvested private information from the Facebook profiles of more than 50 million users without their permission.” As law professor Andrew Keane Woods explains, The data that Cambridge Analytica obtained seems to have come from Aleksandr Kogan, a researcher at Cambridge University who convinced hundreds of thousands of Facebook users to take a Facebook-linked personality quiz—thereby granting Kogan access, through Facebook’s developer platform, to a treasure trove of user data. Kogan then shared…

Read the full story