In light of a recent tragedy, Instagram is updating the way it handles pictures depicting self-harm. Instagram and Facebook announced changes to their policies around content depicting cutting and other forms of self harm in dual blog posts Thursday. The changes comes about in light of the 2017 suicide of a 14 year old girl […]
View More Instagram and Facebook will start censoring ‘graphic images’ of self-harmCategory: United Kingdom
Tech platforms called to support public interest research into mental health impacts
The tech industry has been called on to share data with public sector researchers so the mental health and psychosocial impacts of their service on vulnerable users can be better understood, and also to contribute to funding the necessary independent research over the next ten years. The UK’s chief medical officers have made the call […]
View More Tech platforms called to support public interest research into mental health impactsFabula AI is using social spread to spot ‘fake news’
UK startup Fabula AI reckons it’s devised a way for artificial intelligence to help user generated content platforms get on top of the disinformation crisis that keeps rocking the world of social media with antisocial scandals. Even Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg has sounded a cautious note about AI technology’s capability to meet the complex, contextual, messy […]
View More Fabula AI is using social spread to spot ‘fake news’UK moves towards driverless car tests without safety drivers
The UK government has announced it’s working on a process to support so-called ‘advanced trials’ of autonomous vehicles — i.e. trials without human safety drivers. It also says it will be beefing up the existing Code of Practice for testing driverless cars to provide a framework to support the evolution of the tech, saying it’s on […]
View More UK moves towards driverless car tests without safety driversEurope’s highest human rights court to hear challenge to UK’s bulk surveillance regime
The Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has agreed to hear a legal challenge to the use of bulk data collection surveillance powers by UK intelligence agencies. Last September a lower chamber of the ECHR ruled that UK surveillance practices violated human rights law but did not find bulk collection itself […]
View More Europe’s highest human rights court to hear challenge to UK’s bulk surveillance regimeThriva expands its range of test-at-home kits to add female hormone and cortisol stress tests
UK home health analysis kit startup Thriva is adding three more products to its range later this month: A saliva-based cortisol stress test and two female hormone kits. The Seedcamp-backed UK startup has been offering blood-prick-based health monitoring kits since 2016, and says it’s had more than 50,000 customers sign up to stab their own finger […]
View More Thriva expands its range of test-at-home kits to add female hormone and cortisol stress testsInstagram’s Adam Mosseri to meet UK health secretary over suicide content concerns
The still fresh-in-post boss of Instagram, Adam Mosseri, has been asked to meet the UK’s health secretary, Matt Hancock, to discuss the social media platform’s handling of content that promotes suicide and self harm, the BBC reports. Mosseri’s summons follows an outcry in the UK over disturbing content being recommended to vulnerable users of Instagram, following the suicide […]
View More Instagram’s Adam Mosseri to meet UK health secretary over suicide content concernsOnline platforms still not clear enough about hate speech takedowns: EC
In its latest monitoring report of a voluntary Code of Conduct on illegal hate speech, which platforms including Facebook, Twitter and YouTube signed up to in Europe back in 2016, the European Commission has said progress is being made on speeding up takedowns but tech firms are still lagging when it comes to providing feedback […]
View More Online platforms still not clear enough about hate speech takedowns: ECHealthcare wearables level up with new moves from Apple and Alphabet
Announcements that Apple has partnered with Aetna health insurance on a new app leveraging data from its Apple Watch and reports that Verily — one of the health-focused subsidiaries of Google‘s parent company — Alphabet, is developing a shoe that can detect weight and movement, indicate increasing momentum around using data from wearables for clinical health applications and […]
View More Healthcare wearables level up with new moves from Apple and AlphabetJapan’s “Society 5.0” initiative is a roadmap for today’s entrepreneurs
Mark Minevich Contributor Share on Twitter Mark Minevich is a digital fellow at IPSoft. Japan, still suffering the consequences of its ‘Lost Decade’ of economic stagnation, is eyeing a transformation more radical than any the industrialized world has ever seen. Boldly identified as “Society 5.0” Japan describes its initiative as a purposeful effort to create […]
View More Japan’s “Society 5.0” initiative is a roadmap for today’s entrepreneursBrexit backer’s insurance firm and leave campaign fined £120k by data watchdog
The UK’s data protection watchdog has issued fines against a pro-Brexit campaign, Leave.EU, and an insurance company owned by the largest individual donor to the leave cause, Arron Banks’ Eldon Insurance. The penalties have been handed down for what the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) dubs “serious breaches of electronic marketing laws” during the 2016 referendum on […]
View More Brexit backer’s insurance firm and leave campaign fined £120k by data watchdogSocial media should have “duty of care” towards kids, UK MPs urge
Social media platforms are being urged to be far more transparent about how their services operate and to make “anonymised high-level data” available to researchers so the technology’s effects on users — and especially on children and teens — can be better understood. The calls have been made in a report by the UK parliament’s […]
View More Social media should have “duty of care” towards kids, UK MPs urge