Two separate parliamentary committees, in the UK and Canada, have issued an unprecedented international joint summons for Facebook’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg to appear before them. The committees are investigating the impact of online disinformation on democratic processes and want Zuckerberg to answer questions related to the Cambridge Analytica-Facebook user data misuse scandal, which both have been […]
View More Zuckerberg gets joint summons from UK and Canadian parliamentsCategory: disinformation
Fake news ‘threat to democracy’ report gets back-burner response from UK gov’t
The UK government has rejected a parliamentary committee’s call for a levy on social media firms to fund digital literacy lessons to combat the impact of disinformation online. The recommendation of a levy on social media platforms was made by the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport committee three months ago, in a preliminary report following […]
View More Fake news ‘threat to democracy’ report gets back-burner response from UK gov’tTwitter widens its view of bad actors to fight election fiddlers
Twitter has announced more changes to its rules to try to make it harder for people to use its platform to spread politically charged disinformation and thereby erode democratic processes. In an update on its “elections integrity work” yesterday, the company flagged several new changes to the Twitter Rules which it said are intended to provide “clearer […]
View More Twitter widens its view of bad actors to fight election fiddlersTech and ad giants sign up to Europe’s first weak bite at ‘fake news’
The European Union’s executive body has signed up tech platforms and ad industry players to a voluntary Code of Practice aimed at trying to do something about the spread of disinformation online. Something, just not anything too specifically quantifiable. According to the Commission, Facebook, Google, Twitter, Mozilla, some additional members of the EDIMA trade association, […]
View More Tech and ad giants sign up to Europe’s first weak bite at ‘fake news’Twitter is considering badging bots — “as far as we can detect them”
At today’s Senate Intelligence Committee hearing Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey was asked by vice chair Sen. Mark Warner whether users should have “a right to know” if they are talking to a bot or a human on its platform — to help people better navigate the information they are being exposed to. Dorsey agreed that “more […]
View More Twitter is considering badging bots — “as far as we can detect them”Google rebuked by Senate Intelligence Committee for not sending Page or Pichai to testify
Alphabet’s decision to decline to send its CEO Larry Page to today’s Senate Intelligence Committee hearing — to answer questions about what social media platforms are doing to thwart foreign influence operations intended to sow political division in the U.S. — has earned it a stinging rebuke from the committee’s vice chair, Sen. Mark Warner. “I’m […]
View More Google rebuked by Senate Intelligence Committee for not sending Page or Pichai to testifyGoogle, Facebook, Twitter chiefs called back to Senate Intelligence Committee
Twitter chief executive Jack Dorsey and Facebook chief operations officer Sheryl Sandberg will testify in an open hearing at the Senate Intelligence Committee next week, the committee’s chairman has confirmed. Larry Page, chief executive of Google parent company Alphabet, was also invited but has not confirmed his attendance, a committee spokesperson confirmed to TechCrunch. Sen. […]
View More Google, Facebook, Twitter chiefs called back to Senate Intelligence CommitteeCivil, the blockchain journalism startup, has partnered with one of the oldest names in media
Civil, the two-year-old crypto startup that wants to save the journalism industry by leveraging the blockchain and cryptoeconomics, has partnered with the 172-year-old Associated Press to help the wire service stop bad actors from stealing its content. Civil, using its blockchain-enabled licensing mechanism, which is still in development, will help the AP track where its […]
View More Civil, the blockchain journalism startup, has partnered with one of the oldest names in mediaHere’s Twitter’s position on Alex Jones (and hate-peddling anti-truthers) — hint: It’s a fudge
The number of tech platforms taking action against Alex Jones, the far right InfoWars conspiracy theorist and hate speech preacher, has been rising in recent weeks — with bans or partial bans including from Google, Apple and Facebook. However, as we noted earlier, Twitter is not among them. Although it has banned known hate peddlers […]
View More Here’s Twitter’s position on Alex Jones (and hate-peddling anti-truthers) — hint: It’s a fudgeIs it time to remove Zuckerberg from (his) office?
A colleague, who shall remain nameless (because privacy is not dead), gave a thumbs down to a recent column in the NYT. The complaint was that the writer had attacked tech companies (mostly but not exclusively Facebook) without offering any solutions for these all-powerful techbro CEOs’ orchestral failures to grasp the messy complexities of humanity […]
View More Is it time to remove Zuckerberg from (his) office?Facebook’s chief legal officer to leave this year
Facebook’s chief legal officer Colin Stretch has announced he’ll be out by the end of the year. In the inevitable Facebook post explaining why he’s moving on, Stretch writes that after he and his wife made a decision to move back to DC from California “a few years ago… we knew it would be difficult for me to […]
View More Facebook’s chief legal officer to leave this yearWhatsApp now marks forwarded messages to curb the spread of deadly misinformation
WhatsApp just introduced a new feature designed to help its users identify the origin of information that they receive in the messaging app. For the first time, a forwarded WhatsApp message will include an indicator that marks it as forwarded. It’s a small shift for the messaging platform, but potentially one that could make a […]
View More WhatsApp now marks forwarded messages to curb the spread of deadly misinformation