Turkish MPs to vote on bill that could block Facebook and Twitter

Turkey’s parliament is preparing to vote on a bill that would effectively block sites such as Facebook, Twitter and YouTube unless they comply with strict new regulations, as Ankara significantly steps up its efforts to control social media content.

The draft legislation would force social media companies with more than 1 million daily users in Turkey to establish a formal presence in the country or assign an in-country representative who would be legally accountable to the Turkish authorities.

How Russia Uses Facebook To Lure Americans To Political Rallies

NEW YORK ― On a Saturday evening in the fall of 2017, local activist Amy Bettys schlepped to Union Square in Manhattan, alongside members of the women’s reproductive rights group she works with, to protest a proposed federal restriction on abortion.

She and her group, Women’s Health & Reproductive Rights (WHARR), were attending an event they’d seen posted online, co-sponsored by the local Women’s March Alliance and an organization called the Resisters, which touted itself as being dedicated to “feminist activism against fascism.” It seemed like a good opportunity for WHARR at the time: Here was an event to promote women’s reproductive rights, held on one of the city’s busiest thoroughfares and co-sponsored by a legitimate feminist enterprise in the WMA.

Measles Outbreaks Are Increasing. Experts Think It’s Because of Anti-Vaxxers on Facebook.

Medical experts warn that the internet could be making more of us sick, pointing to research highlighting how online platforms’ role in boosting vaccination opponents and their baseless theories is fueling infectious disease outbreaks across the world.

Two researchers at the University of Stirling in Scotland released a study last year concluding, based on data from January 2011 to August 2017, that there were “statistically significant positive correlations” between the use of anti-vaccination search terms and falling rates of immunizations, suggesting that online anti-vaxxer activity is having real and potentially deadly consequences.

Thousands attended protest organized by Russians on Facebook

Thousands of Americans attended a march last November organized by a Russian group that used social media to interfere in the 2016 election.

The demonstration in New York City, which took place a few days after the election, appears to be the largest and most successful known effort to date pulled off by Russian-linked groups intent on using social media platforms to influence American politics.

The new numbers on fake Russian social media accounts are staggering

At 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday, representatives from Facebook, Twitter, and Google will take questions from a Senate Judiciary subcommittee probing Russia’s disinformation push during the 2016 election. The hearing, entitled “Extremist Content and Russian Disinformation Online: Working with Tech to Find Solutions”, will feature Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch, Twitter General Counsel Sean Edgett, and Google Director of Law Enforcement and Information Security Richard Salgado, as well as a pair of analysts.

Was Facebook Fooled by the Russians, or Did It Know All Along?

Facebook’s political troubles do not appear to be anywhere near ending, despite mea culpas by founder Mark Zuckerberg and COO Sheryl Sandberg that the global social media giant now recognizes its platform was used by Russian troll accounts to influence the 2016 election and its automated advertising platform can be gamed to foment racist messaging.

The past two weeks' media revelations about how, as one New York Times piece put it, Zuckerberg created a 21st-century Frankenstein, a behemoth he cannot control, read like a screenplay from the latest Netflix political thriller. Last weekend, the Washington Post reported that Facebook discovered a Russian-based operation “as it was getting underway” in June 2016, using its platform to spread anti-Democratic Party propaganda. Facebook alerted the FBI. After Facebook traced “a series of shadowy accounts” that were promoting the stolen emails and other Democratic campaign documents, it “once again contacted the FBI.”

Facebook Says Likely Russian-Based Operation Spent Money On Political Ads

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Facebook Inc <FB.O> said on Wednesday it had found that an influence operation likely based in Russia spent $100,000 on thousands of ads promoting divisive social and political messages in a two-year-period through May.

Facebook, the dominant social media network, said that many of the 3,000 ads promoted 470 “inauthentic” accounts and pages that it has now suspended. The ads spread polarizing views on topics including immigration, race and gay rights, rather than backing a particular political candidate, it said.

Facebook’s gender bias goes so deep it’s in the code

A hurricane has been brewing at Facebook.

After years of suspicion, a veteran female Facebook engineer decided to evaluate what if any gaps there were in how female and male engineers’ work was treated.

She did it “so that we can have an insight into how the review process impacts people in various groups,” the Wall Street Journal learned exclusively.

Facebook, Google and WhatsApp plan to increase encryption of user data

Silicon Valley’s leading companies – including Facebook, Google and Snapchat – are working on their own increased privacy technology as Apple fights the US government over encryption, the Guardian has learned.

The projects could antagonize authorities just as much as Apple’s more secure iPhones, which are currently at the center of the San Bernardino shooting investigation. They also indicate the industry may be willing to back up their public support for Apple with concrete action.

Google, Facebook And Microsoft Will Officially Support Apple In Battle Against FBI

(March 3 (Reuters) - Tech industry leaders including Alphabet Inc's Google, Facebook Inc, Microsoft Corp , AT&T and more than two dozen other Internet and technology companies were filing legal briefs on Thursday asking a judge to support Apple Inc in its encryption battle with the U.S. government, court documents and sources familiar with the companies' plans said.

The rare display of unity and support from Apple's sometime-rivals showed the breadth of Silicon Valley's opposition to the government's anti-encryption effort.

Facebook Is Changing Your News Feed In A Subtle But Important Way

Facebook is introducing a new way to track what you do on your News Feed.

The social network will now weigh two different factors when deciding what to show you, the company announced in a blog post Monday.

Facebook Is Making Billions Off Its Smartphone Users

(Reuters) - Facebook Inc <FB.O> reported a 51.7 percent jump in revenue for the final quarter of 2015 as new advertising formats and an improved mobile app drove a sharp rise in ad sales.

The company's total revenue rose to $5.84 billion from $3.85 billion a year earlier, with ad revenue increasing 56.8 percent to $5.64 billion in the holiday shopping period, when spending on advertising typically spikes.

Zuckerberg’s Get-Away Car -- The Facebook founder's “philanthropy” lets him stash his billions without paying taxes.

Let us now praise “Lord Zuckerberg, The Magnificent!”

Mark Zuckerberg, the wunderkind of Silicon Valley who co-founded Facebook and amassed roughly a gabillion dollars in personal wealth, is now being hailed as a new giant of American altruism.

What's Behind Facebook's Censoring Of Atheists In India

A few days ago a petition popped up on the website Change.org urging Mark Zuckerberg to “support freedom of expression in India” by unblocking an atheist Facebook group there with over 13,000 members.

Student Loses Facebook Internship After Highlighting Dangers Of Location Tool

Third-year Harvard University student Aran Khanna had it made: secured an internship at Facebook, created a Chrome browser extension, and highlighted potential privacy concern lurking in his soon-to-be employer’s messaging system — the latter of which caused weeks of controversy that cost him an opportunity with the world’s largest social media company.

The controversy stemmed from Khanna’s Chrome app Marauder’s Map, which extrapolated data through Facebook Messenger’s geo-location feature that allowed friends to automatically share their whereabouts via private messages. Facebook rescinded Khanna’s internship offer after learning about the app over privacy concerns.

Facebook Hired Temporary Foreign Software Engineers in Vancouver

The Canadian government gave Facebook the green light to hire 93 temporary foreign workers in its Vancouver offices, federal documents reveal.

The company would not speak on record about its successful 2013 applications or confirm that each of the 15-month contract positions were filled. A Facebook Canada spokesperson said the jobs were among roughly 150 at an engineering office opened in Vancouver, one of only five worldwide that hosted engineers at the time.

According to federal Labour Market Opinions issued by Employment and Social Development Canada, Facebook successfully applied for 88 software engineers and four production engineers -- both jobs requiring only a bachelor's degree and English proficiency -- as well as one position of "Audience Researcher, Vertical Measurement" which required a PhD.

Here's The Letter Calling On Mark Zuckerberg To Help 'Servant'-Like Bus Drivers

Facebook's bus drivers are treated like "servants" who shuttle the company's "noblemen" employees to and from work every day, according to a letter sent to Mark Zuckerberg last week.

The letter, written by Rome Aloise, principal officer of the Teamsters Union branch in Northern California, calls out Zuckerberg for the unfair treatment of Facebook's shuttle bus drivers, who are seeking union representation.

Conservatives spike Facebook comments critical of China deal

Conservative staff members deleted comments critical of the Canada-China investment deal that were posted on the party's Facebook page.

Angry notes about the controversial Foreign Investment Promotion and Protection Agreement (FIPA) were among more than 100 Facebook comments purged from the party's page in less than a week, an analysis by Postmedia News found.

Federal government is ‘creeping’ your Facebook page

OTTAWA–Ottawa is creeping you on Facebook.

The government that characterized the long-form census as unduly intrusive is increasingly lifting Canadians’ personal information from their social networking websites, according to the federal privacy watchdog.

In a letter to Treasury Board President Tony Clement, interim privacy commissioner Chantal Bernier said an “increasing number” of government institutions are collecting publicly available personal information from sites like Facebook and Twitter “without any direct relation to a program or activity.”

Facebook's Plan For Artificial Intelligence: Transcribe Your Calls, Decipher Your Photos

On Facebook's earnings call Wednesday afternoon, Mark Zuckerberg offered a peek at the social network's long-term plans for artificial intelligence. And just as we explained in November, Facebook hopes AI will help it more thoroughly understand the meaning of everything you share, from gauging your mood by the words in your status update, to picking out a Coke can in your photos.

Facebook has been working to expand its artificial intelligence research lab, and last month appointed a renowned researcher with expertise in deep learning to oversee it. Deep learning is a sub-field within AI that focuses on training computers to make sense of the many messy, undefined and irregular types of data we humans generate, such as when we speak, write, photograph or film. (Teaching a computer to recognize a cat, for example, turns out to be an extremely difficult problem.)