Cressida Dick calls for more action to stop online radicalisation and questions push towards end-to-end encryption
The UK most senior police officer has accused technology firms of failing to identify, monitor and report the activity of terrorists, in a plea for improved access to social media platforms.
Dame Cressida Dick, the Metropolitan police commissioner, also questioned the push to expand end-to-end encryption in a speech to law enforcement officials on Monday.
Continue reading...The New Democratic party’s leader is riding high in the polls – and could be the kingmaker in next week’s election
He’s the most-liked national political leader in Canada, wears sharply tailored suits, has graced the pages of a men’s fashion magazine and is followed by starstruck fans on social media. And he’s not Justin Trudeau.
With Canada heading to the polls after a snap election controversially called by Trudeau, Jagmeet Singh, leader of the progressive New Democratic party (NDP), has quickly emerged as the most affable politician in Canada – and a powerful figure who is unlikely to become prime minister.
Continue reading...Suspended union rep calls on social media giant to intervene after exhausted workers complain of extra workload
Facebook’s facilities management firm has demanded the removal of a union activist leading a campaign against “impossible workloads” imposed on exhausted cleaners at the US tech giant’s London offices.
Emails seen by the Observer show JLL @ Facebook, which manages the social media firm’s London sites, asked Churchill Group, which employs the cleaners, to remove the workers’ elected union rep, Guillermo Camacho, from Facebook’s offices after he helped organise protests against a doubling of cleaning duties in July.
Continue reading...The iPhone maker may be set to break market records, but it’s starting to look more and more like a one-gadget pony
If Apple is to become the world’s first three-trillion-dollar company, the iPhone will play a key role in that feat. The tech firm unveils the latest iteration of its signature product on Tuesday, and the success of the iPhone 13 will determine how quickly Apple goes from its current market capitalisation of just under $2.5tn (£1.8tn) to $3tn.
“We believe Apple is on a trajectory to hit $3tn by early 2022 and the iPhone 13 will be a lynchpin of growth,” says Dan Ives of investment firm Wedbush Securities.
Continue reading...Billed as the most secure phone on the planet, An0m became a viral sensation in the underworld. There was just one problem for anyone using it for criminal means: it was run by the police
The rain pattered lightly on the harbour of the Belgian port city of Ghent when, on 21 June 2021, a team of professional divers slipped below the surface into the emerald murk. The Brazilian tanker, heavy with fruit juice bound for Australia, had already crossed the Atlantic Ocean, but its journey wasn’t halfway done as the divers felt their way along the barnacled serration of its hull. They were looking for the sea chest, a metallic inlet below the water line, through which the ship draws seawater to cool its engines. Tucked inside, they found what they were looking for: three long sacks, each wrapped in a thick black plastic bag and trussed with black and white striped nautical rope.
The sacks were heavy. Each one weighed as much as a sheep and, shaped like a body bag, could feasibly have contained one. As the Belgian police opened the first bag, a stack of crimson bricks slid out. Had this cargo reached Australia, where high demand and meagre supply has pushed the price of a kilo of cocaine to eight times its equivalent cost in North America, the haul would have been worth more than A$64m (£34m).
Continue reading...Sergei Ryabkov’s claim of interference in Duma vote believed to be reference to anti-Putin apps on Apple and Google
The Russian foreign ministry has summoned the US ambassador, John Sullivan, to complain about alleged interference by “American digital giants” in Russia’s upcoming parliamentary election.
According to a ministry statement on Friday, the deputy foreign minister, Sergei Ryabkov, claimed Russia “possesses irrefutable evidence of the violation of Russian legislation by American digital giants in the context of the preparation and conduct of elections to the state Duma”.
Continue reading...Documents show company dragged feet to correct disparity after learning it was failing to comply with laws in UK, Europe and Asia
Google has been illegally underpaying thousands of temporary workers in dozens of countries and delayed correcting the pay rates for more than two years as it attempted to cover up the problem, the Guardian can reveal.
Google executives have been aware since at least May 2019 that the company was failing to comply with local laws in the UK, Europe and Asia that mandate temporary workers be paid equal rates to full-time employees performing similar work, internal Google documents and emails reviewed by the Guardian show.
Continue reading...Vast range of new regulations prompt fears of a return to tight social control of pre-reform days
On the second floor of a nondescript concrete building in north-east Beijing, the Youyou internet cafe is less than half full. Quiet and dark, the cafe’s customers are all adults, sitting in brown sofas in front of screens set up for hours of comfortable online gaming.
Minors aren’t allowed in, and a poster on the glass entrance reads: “The whole society together cares about the healthy growth of underage teens.” Under new regulations from the Chinese government, minors are limited to just a few hours of gaming a week, with tech platforms ordered to enforce it. The intervention is just one of a recent rush of directives from Beijing aimed at reshaping society.
Continue reading...Site was removed from GoDaddy before being censored by new host Epik, known for providing services to far-right groups
Troubles are mounting for a Texas website used to report violators of the state’s extreme anti-abortion legislation after the site was forced offline by two different web hosting platforms.
The site ProLifeWhistleblower.com was removed from its original web host by the provider GoDaddy on Friday before being suspended by its new host, an agency known for providing services to far-right groups.
Continue reading...Police claim plans for end-to-end encryption will stop officers being able to access ‘incisive intelligence’
Facebook’s plans to allow encrypted messaging across all its platforms could prevent the detection of up to 20m child abuse images every year, a senior investigating officer has claimed.
Rob Jones, the director of threat leadership at the National Crime Agency, said the social media company’s goal of rolling out end-to-end encryption will stop officers from accessing “incisive intelligence” that allows them to rescue abused children.
Continue reading...Digital ID systems are a powerful development tool, providing a legal identity to millions, but their misuse can be deadly
The Taliban have openly talked about using US-made digital identity technology to hunt down Afghans who have worked with the international coalition – posing a huge threat to everyone recorded in the system. In addition, the extremists now also have access to – and control over – the digital identification systems and technologies built through international aid support.
These include the e-Tazkira, a biometric identity card used by Afghanistan’s National Statistics and Information Authority, which includes fingerprints, iris scans and a photograph, as well as voter registration databases. It also includes the Afghan personnel and pay system, used by the interior and defence ministries to pay the army and police.
Continue reading...Wear OS 3 watch ups ante for Android wearables, now faster and feature-packed with body-fat scanner
The Galaxy Watch 4 is Samsung and Google’s attempt to combine efforts and compete with Apple’s smartwatch – and it gets about 80% of the way there.
The Android smartwatch comes in two designs and four sizes, starting at £249 ($250) for the Watch 4 and £349 ($350) – as tested – for the Watch 4 Classic. They succeed the £269 Watch Active 2 and £399 Watch 3 respectively.
Continue reading...TikTok, Twitter and Facebook among companies bringing in new measures worldwide that protect children
TikTok has turned off notifications for children past bedtime, Instagram has disabled targeted adverts for under-18s entirely and YouTube has turned off autoplay for teen users: moves seemingly triggered by Britain introducing a new set of regulations aimed at protecting children online.
On Thursday the UK introduced a new set of regulations aimed at protecting children and at a stroke became a global leader in the field, with the prospect of multimillion-dollar fines for companies that breach its new “age appropriate design code” leading to a cascade of last-minute changes across some of Silicon Valley’s largest players.
Continue reading...Company says it will ‘collect input and make improvements’ after backlash from privacy groups
Apple will delay its plans to begin scanning user images for child sexual abuse material (CSAM) before uploading them to the cloud, the company says, after a backlash from privacy groups.
The company’s proposal, first revealed in August, involved a new technique it had developed called “perceptual hashing” to compare photos with known images of child abuse when users opted to upload them to the cloud. If the company detected enough matches, it would manually review the images, before flagging the user account to law enforcement.
Continue reading...Swedish pop group shows cross-generational appeal, amassing 5.5m likes on TikTok since 1 September
Two singles released from Abba’s first album in 40 years have raced to the top of the streaming charts, in a comeback that has generated praise and excitement among fans who remember the original releases and a new younger audience.
The first two singles from Abba’s forthcoming album, to be released on 5 November, were in first and third place on YouTube’s trending rankings in 12 countries on Friday, including the UK. I Still Have Faith In You gained 4.4m views within 24 hours in Britain and Don’t Shut Me Down 1.4m views.
In a further confirmation of the Scandinavian pop band’s cross-generational appeal, Abba have already amassed 991,000 followers and 5.5m likes on TikTok despite only joining the platform on 1 September.
The author on why he’s chosen to release his next book on the online platform – and why he hopes digital won’t see off the medium he loves most
Out of the gloom Salman Rushdie floats into view, his familiar face with short beard and glasses hovering on screen in front of a library that should win any competition for the most impressive Zoom bookshelf backdrop.
From his New York apartment he is here to share three things: he has made a deal to publish his next work of fiction as a serialised novella on Substack; he intends to fulfil a long held, once thwarted desire to be a film critic; and he still doesn’t have the courage to write poetry.
Continue reading...US tech firm fined for not complying with order to come up with proposals on compensating publishers
Google is appealing against a €500m (£430m) fine imposed by France’s antitrust watchdog after a dispute with local media about paying for news content.
The financial penalty came amid increasing international pressure on online platforms such as Google and Facebook to share more of the revenue they make from using media outlets’ content.
Continue reading...Some of site’s largest subreddits switch to private, saying Reddit is failing to tackle misinformation
Reddit has been hit by a user rebellion over the online discussion forum’s failure to tackle misinformation related to Covid and vaccines.
More than 135 Reddit communities, or subreddits, have “gone dark”, which blocks non-members from reading or joining the page, in protest at the site’s refusal to limit discussions that propagate misleading theories about the pandemic. The protest covers many of the site’s largest subreddits, including r/Futurology and r/TIFU, which have more than 10 million subscribers each.
Continue reading...Catherine Chen says Chinese telecoms firm will use technical expertise to reach new markets less dependent on the US
Huawei has been forced to adopt the mentality of a startup partly because of US government sanctions, Catherine Chen, a board member for the Chinese telecommunications company, has said.
Helping to run probably the most scrutinised company in the world, she said Huawei would survive and eventually break free of the attempted US shackles by using its technical expertise to forge a path into new markets less dependent on the US, such as energy conservation, artificial intelligence and electric cars.
Continue reading...Hailing end to toxic fuel additive, Guterres says same commitment is needed to eliminate other pollutants
The UN secretary general and environmentalists have welcomed a declaration by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) on the end of leaded petrol in the face of years of “underhand” opposition.
As Algeria became the last country to stop selling the toxic fuel last month, the two-decade campaign to ban it has been called a “milestone for multilateralism”.
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