Category Archives: Technology

Republicans use section 230 hearing to berate tech CEOs and claim Trump is ‘censored’

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Congressional hearing with Twitter, Facebook and Google CEOs was meant to focus on federal law that protects internet companies

Republican lawmakers berated the CEOs of Twitter, Facebook and Google in a hearing that was ostensibly about a federal law protecting internet companies but mostly focused on how those companies deal with disinformation from Donald Trump and other conservatives.

Jack Dorsey, Mark Zuckerberg and Sundar Pichai testified before Congress on Wednesday about section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a law underpinning US internet regulation that exempts platforms from legal liability for content generated by its users.

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Joe Rogan hosts Alex Jones on Spotify podcast despite ban

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Interview with conspiracy theorist leaves streaming service in awkward position

Joe Rogan, Spotify’s biggest podcast star, has left the platform in an awkward position after conducting a lengthy interview with Alex Jones, the conspiracy theorist banned by Swedish streaming company for producing “hate content”.

Rogan, the libertarian host of the long-running and wildly popular Joe Rogan Experience podcast, uploaded a three-hour discussion on Tuesday featuring Jones, the founder of the conspiracy site Infowars.

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Donald Trump’s campaign investigating ‘attack’ on website

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Website was restored after briefly displaying warning that it was seized because ‘world’ had enough of ‘fake-news’ spread by Trump

Donald Trump’s campaign says its website was “defaced” on Tuesday evening, and that it is working with law enforcement to investigate the source of what it called an “attack”.

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Kazakh-American group claims Borat Subsequent Moviefilm ‘incites violence’

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The Kazakh American Association has released a letter on social media accusing Sacha Baron Cohen’s latest Borat film of ‘justifying harassment’

A group of Kazakh-Americans has demanded that Amazon withdraw Borat Subsequent Moviefilm, Sacha Baron Cohen’s new satirical comedy which – like its 2006 predecessor Borat – identifies Kazakhstan as the home country of its fictional journalist character Borat Sagdiyev.

In a letter published on social media shortly before the film’s official launch, addressed to three senior Amazon executives, the Kazakh American Association says that Borat Subsequent Moviefilm “may cause irreparable harm to to Kazakhstan’s national image and people as its comedic nature may justify ethnicity-based harassment”. It adds: “This film incites violence against a highly vulnerable and under-represented minority ethnic group.”

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‘Shocking’ hack of psychotherapy records in Finland affects thousands

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Distressed patients flood support services after hack of private firm Vastaamo

The confidential treatment records of tens of thousands of psychotherapy patients in Finland have been hacked and some leaked online, in what the interior minister described as “a shocking act”.

Distressed patients flooded victim support services over the weekend as Finnish police revealed that hackers had accessed records belonging to the private company Vastaamo, which runs 25 therapy centres across Finland. Thousands have reportedly filed police complaints over the breach.

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Big tech accused of avoiding $2.8bn in tax to poorest countries

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Reform of international corporate taxation could transform health and education, says report

Big US technology companies are exploiting loopholes in global tax rules to avoid paying as much as $2.8bn (£2.1bn) tax a year in developing countries, according to research by the anti-poverty charity ActionAid International.

Facebook, Google and Microsoft have been accused of failing to pay a fair amount of taxes in poor countries where governments are struggling to provide even basic healthcare or education to their citizens.

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Lee Kun-hee, Samsung Electronics chairman, dies aged 78

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Transformative leader who took over from father made Samsung a global name with turnover worth a fifth of South Korea’s GDP

The Samsung Electronics chairman, Lee Kun-hee, who made the South Korean company a global name, has died at the age of 78.

Under Lee’s leadership Samsung rose to become the world’s largest producer of smartphones and memory chips, with overall turnover equivalent to a fifth of South Korea’s GDP.

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UK has mounted covert attacks against Russian leadership, says ex-mandarin

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Former cabinet secretary Mark Sedwill says UK used offensive cyber-capability to exploit Moscow’s ‘vulnerabilities’

Britain has carried a series of covert attacks on Russia’s leaders and their allies, the former cabinet secretary has disclosed.

Mark Sedwill said the UK had sought to exploit Moscow’s “vulnerabilities”, including through the deployment of its recently declared offensive cyber-capability.

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Facebook moderators forced to work in Dublin office despite high-tier lockdown

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Exclusive: Contract staff deemed essential workers as firm’s own employees work from home

Facebook moderators working for one of the company’s Dublin-based contractors are being forced to go into the office, even as Ireland returns to its highest tier of Covid lockdown, after their employer categorised them as “essential workers”.

Staff with personal shielding requirements are exempt from the order, but those with high-risk family members at home have been told by the contractor, CPL, that they are still required in the office.

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Trump’s Twitter hacked after Dutch researcher claims he guessed password – report

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Victor Gevers claimed he had access to president’s account, De Volkskrant reported, but Twitter said ‘we’ve seen no evidence’

Donald Trump’s Twitter account was allegedly hacked last week, after a Dutch researcher correctly guessed the president’s password: “maga2020!”, Dutch media reported.

Victor Gevers, a security expert, had access to Trump’s direct messages, could post tweets in his name and change his profile, De Volkskrant newspaper reported.

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AITA? How a Reddit forum posed the defining question of our age

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Every day, people leave their quandaries on the Reddit website – asking others to judge whether they were in the wrong. As religion wanes, are we crowdsourcing our ethics?

First of all, you need to picture the sandwich.

This was a 6ft-long party sub from a local deli, with loaves of bread braided together to make one super-sandwich – nearly twice the standard width, and loaded with fillings. It would have comfortably fed 20 to 25 people, and there were far fewer coming over to watch the fight.

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Airbus to operate drones searching for migrants crossing the Mediterranean

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European aerospace giant and two Israeli arms firms win EU contracts totalling €100m

Airbus and two Israeli arms companies will be paid €100m (£91m) to operate unmanned drones to spot refugees and migrants attempting to cross the Mediterranean sea to Europe, according to EU contracts.

Drone operations over the Mediterranean will start next year, after testing carried out on the Greek island of Crete.

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US justice department sues Google over accusation of illegal monopoly

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Lawsuit accuse tech company of abusing its position to dominate search and search advertising

The US justice department filed a lawsuit against Google on Tuesday, accusing the tech company of abusing its position to maintain an illegal monopoly over search and search advertising.

“Two decades ago, Google became the darling of Silicon Valley as a scrappy startup with an innovative way to search the emerging internet. That Google is long gone,” the suit alleged.

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Far-right online forum 8chan loses internet after protection services are cut

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Site was back online Monday morning with a Russian company enlisted to protect it from DDoS attacks

The latest incarnation of the hate-filled online forum 8chan was temporarily kicked off the internet on Sunday, after a company protecting the site from DDoS attacks cut its services.

The site, which is now called 8kun but was formerly known as 8chan, was back online on Monday morning, security researcher Brian Krebs reported, with a Russian company freshly enlisted to provide the protection services.

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Twitter softens policy on hacking after row over blocked New York Post story

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Move follows criticism from Republicans and others over story about Joe Biden’s son

Twitter has softened its policies against the sharing of hacked material after the backlash over its decision to block a New York Post story about Joe Biden’s son.

Republican senators declared their intention to subpoena the Twitter co-founder, Jack Dorsey next week, forcing him to explain the decision, after he apologised for the lack of communication about the blocking.

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Twitter down: social media platform suffers global outage with users unable to post

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Millions of users left unable to tweet or share stories for more than an hour

Twitter has suffered an outage in many countries across the world, leaving millions of users unable to post to its platform.

The entire social media site went down for a number of minutes and, although it was quickly brought back online, users were unable to tweet or retweet anything for more than an hour.

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Biden article row shows how US election is testing Facebook and Twitter

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Online giants felt forced to take unprecedented action as they struggle with role during divisive presidential battle

Mere hours after the publication of a controversial New York Post article critical of Joe Biden, both Twitter and Facebook took unprecedented action to restrict distribution of the post.

Facebook, a company spokesman revealed, had immediately begun to “reduce its distribution on our platform”, altering how the company’s recommendation algorithm would normally react to such a viral story in order to buy its third-party fact checkers time to come to a conclusion about its veracity.

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Facebook and Twitter restrict controversial New York Post story on Joe Biden

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Social media platforms move to limit spread of article amid questions over its veracity

Facebook and Twitter took steps on Wednesday to limit the spread of a controversial New York Post article critical of Joe Biden, sparking outrage among conservatives and stoking debate over how social media platforms should tackle misinformation ahead of the US election.

In an unprecedented step against a major news publication, Twitter blocked users from posting links to the Post story or photos from the unconfirmed report. Users attempting to share the story were shown a notice saying: “We can’t complete this request because this link has been identified by Twitter or our partners as being potentially harmful.” Users clicking or retweeting a link already posted to Twitter are shown a warning the “link may be unsafe”.

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Apple unveils new 5G iPhone 12 line in multiple sizes

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New designs and cameras revealed alongside smaller HomePod smart speaker

Apple has unveiled its delayed iPhone 12 line of smartphones in a range of sizes with new designs and 5G connectivity.

Unveiled as part of a online-only event, which was pushed back by more than a month due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the new iPhones mark some of the biggest changes to Apple’s smartphones since the iPhone X in 2017.

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UK’s test and trace ‘having marginal impact’: which countries got it right?

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Scientists’ verdict on £12bn system has refocused attention on what is working elsewhere in cutting Covid-19 transmission rates

The newly released assessment by the UK government’s scientific advisers that the £12bn test and trace programme “is having a marginal impact” in reducing Covid-19 transmission has refocused attention on how other countries are faring with their regimes.

Since test-and-trace programmes were first mooted around the world at the outset of the pandemic – including monitoring via apps or hardware – they have been beset by issues of privacy and public support over both downloading and using apps and also with a wider willingness to abide by isolation measures.

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