Tag: social media

Senate Passes Kids’ “Safety” Bills Despite Privacy, Digital ID, and Censorship Concerns

Two bills combined – the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) and the Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA 2.0) – have passed in the US Senate in a 91-3 vote, and will now be considered by the House.

Criticism of the bills focuses mainly on the likelihood that, if and when they become law, they will help expand online digital ID verification, as well as around issues like censorship (removal and blocking of content).

The effort to make KOSA and COPA 2.0 happen was spearheaded by a parent group that was pushing lawmakers and tech companies’ executives to move in this direction, and their main demand was to enact new rules that would prevent cyberbullying and other harms.

And now the main sponsors, senators Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat, and Republican Marsha Blackburn are trying to dispel these concerns, suggesting these are not “speech bills” and do not (directly) impose age verification.

Further defending the bills, they say that the legislation does not mandate that internet platforms start collecting even more user data, and reject the notion it is invasive of people’s privacy.

But the problem is that although technically true, this interpretation of the bills’ impact is ultimately incorrect, as some of their provisions do encourage censorship, facilitate the introduction of digital ID for age verification, and leave the door open for mass collection of online users’ data – under specific circumstances – and end ending anonymity online.

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Elon Musk’s ‘Election Interference’

A “White Dudes for Harris” Zoom call reportedly raised $4 million in donations for Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign. After the call, the @dudes4Harris account on X was briefly suspended.

Is this election interference?

If we remain in reality, the answer is of course not.

Even if X CEO Elon Musk ordered the account suspended because of its politics, there would be no (legal) wrongdoing here. X is a private platform, and it doesn’t have any obligation to be politically neutral. Explicitly suppressing pro-Harris content would be a bad business model, surely, but it would not be illegal. Musk and the platform formerly known as Twitter have no obligation to equally air conservative and progressive views or give equal treatment to Republican and Democratic candidates.

But there’s no evidence that X was deliberately trying to thwart Harris organizers. The dudes4Harris account—which has no direct affiliation to the Harris campaign—was suspended after it promoted and held its Zoom call and was back the next day. That’s a pretty bad plan if the goal was to stop its influence or fundraising. And there are all sorts of legitimate reasons why X may have suspended the account.

The account’s suspension is “not that surprising,” writes Techdirt Editor in Chief Mike Masnick (who, it should be noted, is intensely critical of X policies and Musk himself on many issues). “Shouldn’t an account suddenly amassing a ton of followers with no clear official connection to the campaign and pushing people to donate maybe ring some internal alarm bells on any trust and safety team? It wouldn’t be a surprise if it tripped some guardwires and was locked and/or suspended briefly while the account was reviewed. That’s how this stuff works.”

If we step out of reality into the partisan hysteria zone, however, then the account’s temporary suspension was clearly an attempt by Musk to sway the 2024 election.

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Gab Founder Andrew Torba Allegedly Finds Evidence that Trump Would-Be Assassin Thomas Crooks Had an Account on Gab and Supported Joe Biden

On Wednesday, Gab founder Andrew Torba reported that his staff had allegedly found evidence that Trump shooter Thomas Crooks may have had an account on the free speech social media platform.

Torba published nine posts that he believes were written on the social media platform by Thomas Matthew Crooks.

Andrew Torba reported on Gab:

Approximately 30 minutes ago, Gab learned that Thomas Crooks, the deranged Joe Biden supporter who attempted to assassinate President Donald Trump, may have had an account on our platform. We are unable to confirm that the account in question actually belonged to him.

The account was last active on the site in 2021. As far as we are aware, the account did not use the site to send any direct messages. He posted on the site nine (9) times total.

While the account made very few posts on the site, the majority of them were in support of President Biden. A number of posts in particular expressed support for President Biden’s COVID lockdowns, border policies and executive orders.

We have saved the account data pending receipt of a search warrant.

Andrew Torba later posted a request for prayers.

Would appreciate some prayer. I’m sticking my neck out big time on this one, but I felt it was the right thing to do in the public interest.

Kanekoa the Great later published on his Twitter page the images allegedly posted by Thomas Crooks on Gab.

Kanekoa added this:

NEW: Thomas Matthew Crooks made nine posts on Gab supporting President Biden, COVID lockdowns, and Biden’s border policies, according to Gab Founder Andrew Torba (
@BasedTorba
).

“Im sorry explain to me how trump was ever concerned with what the left wanted, or anybody in the GOP for that matter?”

“The reason all the deaths are down is because you are in stuck in your house.”

“Actually the executive order allows an easier path to US citizenship therefore no longer making them illegals and allowing children to join their already legalized immigrant parents in the US.”

“first of all Biden executive orders don’t incentivize human trafficking as human traffickers aren’t interested in citizenships, likewise the majority of illegal immigrants are not criminals and in fact some studies(such as the one linked below) show lower rates of crime committed by these individuals, it is also unclear if the extensive path to citizenship is in fact effective at routing out potential bad actors hence why there is a review of that system.”

“Thats funny because the first order mandates a reuniting of any families separated at the border, the 2nd and 3rd orders a review of trumps immigration policies and other previous policies. However his order doesn’t actually open borders or reduce the authority of border patrol, or anything that would substantially reduce BP effectiveness.”

Of course, additional context is needed to confirm these Gab posts belonged to Crooks.

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New Emails Reveal Big Tech-Biden Admin Collusion on COVID-19 Narratives, Involving CDC and Twitter Censorship

Trying to refute collusive practices involving major social media companies is probably not high on the agenda of the US government right this moment; nevertheless, the evidence of the highly controversial practice keeps rolling in.

America First Legal (AFL), a conservative non-profit, has disclosed a new batch of documents obtained through litigation, this time against the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). It concerns May 2021 communications meant to set the tone online and “manage” the government agenda around topics related to Covid vaccines.

The emails were exchanged between Facebook and CDC – and the documents focus on the activities of CDC spokesperson Carol Crawford, who also “happened” to be involved with Twitter’s Partner Support Portal around the same time.

This Twitter program’s “secret superpower” was that it allowed government-affiliated individuals to participate in flagging content for censorship.

Genelle Adrien (of the Politics and Government Outreach Team over at Facebook) and Crawford “star” in the email chain obtained by AFL, with the latter being asked point blank that the CDC approve Facebook’s “COVID-19 Information Center FAQ.”

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Australian Ministers Urge Stricter Online Censorship of “Misogynistic” Speech

The Australian government’s commitment to online censorship is playing out in yet another way – the perceived harmful influence social platforms have on young men and boys.

Aligned media outlets agree these sites are showing too much content that is branded as misogynistic and promoting harmful gender stereotypes.

Meanwhile, government ministers want to see the companies behind platforms “do” (aka, censor) more.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland, known for her pro-censorship stance, and Social Services Minister Amanda Rishworth are both quoted in a Guardian article about an “experiment” the outlet carried out by setting up fake accounts representing “generic 24-year-old males” on Facebook and Instagram.

The accounts did not interact – the goal was to see what would be showing up in their algorithmically-recommended feeds. And that the device and the email used to sign up were new, was apparently enough for the Guardian to believe they were safe from Meta’s tracking.

The article’s conclusion is that over the following several months, the feeds started to “veer into more highly sexist content,” especially on Facebook.

But it looks like the majority were memes about sitcoms, Star Wars, “dudebro” memes, Daily Mail, etc., news posts, while Instagram’s biggest “offense” seems to have been showing images of “scantily-clad women.”

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UK Sports Commentator Faces Court for “Malicious Communications” Charges Over Social Media Posts

Free speech supporters are alarmed after former Premier League player Joey Barton has been slapped with charges of alleged “malicious communications” directed towards sports commentator and past England Women’s team star Eni Aluko.

Responding to the accusations, Barton labeled the judiciary as a “banana republic.” A court date has been set for July 30 following a probe by Cheshire Police in England.

Earlier this year, Barton likened Aluko and fellow commentator Lucy Ward to Fred and Rose West.

Fred and Rose West were a British married couple who committed a series of murders, sexual assaults, and acts of torture against young women and girls, including some of their own children, between the 1960s and 1980s in Gloucestershire, England.

After a police investigation into Barton’s contentious actions, charges were brought by the Crown Prosecution Service. The 41-year-old ex-footballer is set to face these charges at Warrington Magistrates’ Court.

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Cops Threaten To Take Kids From Family Terrorized by Anti-Christian Reddit Group

J.D. Lott and his wife Britney were eating lunch with their eight kids on April 30 when he missed a call on his cellphone. The family was three years into a cross-country, home-schooling, Instagram-documented road trip in a bus they refashioned into an RV. A day earlier they had been staying at a Florida campground. The next day, they were in Georgia on their way to meet friends—or so they thought.

Half an hour later, the missed caller sent a text saying that they were from the Department of Children and Families (DCF) in Florida. It continued: “Please respond we need to follow up and verify the children are safe. If we cannot complete this we will have to see an Order To Take Into Custody which is enforceable nationwide. Please work with us so we do not have to do that. Thank you.”

A nationwide manhunt? With the possibility of having their children taken away?

“It’s like a knife to the heart,” J.D. Lott tells Reason.

The Lotts quickly pieced together what was happening: Online trolls had figured out how to weaponize child protective services.

The Lotts’ Instagram account, @AmericanFamilyRoadTrip, has over half a million followers. On Reddit there’s a group, FundieSnarkUncensored, that makes fun of people it believes are Christian Fundamentalists. The Lotts are often the target of the group’s criticisms. Lately, the snark had been getting darker.

When Britney had her eighth child, Boone, two weeks earlier and posted a video with him, the Reddit group started armchair diagnosing him. They said the healthy newborn had “severe sunburn,” “was lethargic,” and had “jaundice.”

Participants on the Reddit group whipped themselves into a frenzy, convinced that Boone was in grave danger and his parents were to blame. They used a screenshot of a video the Lotts had posted from their Florida campground stay to geolocate the family. Then someone called the local Florida DCF office and repeated, verbatim, the accusations posted on Reddit: The newborn was sunburnt, lethargic, and jaundiced.

A county caseworker drove to the campground and was upset the family wasn’t there. She reached the Lotts using a phone number the campground supplied, and J.D. Lott explained the strange situation to her.

“We have a group of people on Reddit that we’ve discovered are dedicated to defaming us,” he said.

The caseworker seemed to take this all in, and the Lotts, though shaken, thought everything was fine—until another call came in at lunchtime.

A supervisor at the DCF office decided the case was critical. According to J.D. Lott, he threatened to issue a nationwide order to take the kids into custody.

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“Day Has Finally Come”: Instagram Censors Team USA Rifle Shooter Ahead Of Paris Paralympics

Big tech’s crackdown on “gunfluencers” is nothing new, but policies at social media companies are becoming increasingly restrictive (read: here), leading to the demonetization of numerous channels. The latest victim of this aggressive censorship isn’t even the typical gun YouTuber but instead a competitive rifle shooter on Team USA for the Paralympics. 

Just The News reports that McKenna Geer, a competitive rifle shooter, had her Instagram account censored before she heads to Paris for the Paralympic Games in late August. Next week, the Olympic Games are set to begin.

Geer’s Instagram account, “kennageer10.9,” was reportedly censored by the social media company because of photos she posted with firearms at a qualifying competition. 

“I have always feared the day the media would censor my sport and speech just because I use firearms,” Geer wrote on Instagram, adding, “That day has finally come.” 

She continued, “This sport is life-changing because of its ability to unite both able-bodied and disabled athletes, young and old, foreign and domestic. Me and my fellow athletes rely on our social media accounts to spread the word about our sport, firearm safety, build our personal brand, and connect with potential sponsors. Many of us (myself included) are either not paid or paid very little for our involvement in this sport. Our social media presence can often be the avenue that pays for us to continue competing.”

Geer posted a screenshot of an image that shows her account has been censored.

“Your account and content won’t appear in places like Explore, Search, Suggested Users, Reels, and Feed Recommendations,” the Instagram notification reads.

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YouTube Tightens Stranglehold On Firearms Content — Blocks All Gun-related Sponsors

When Google and YouTube first announced that they would be demonetizing a host of channels back in 2017 (including firearms-related content) they said is was because advertisers were “complaining” about their ads being featured in videos that were contrary to their messaging.  In other words, the excuse was that ads embedded on firearms channels might give their customers the “wrong impression” about those companies and their products, and Google didn’t want to anger their advertising partners.

It’s hard to say how accurate this claim was. The exposure of ESG and Big Tech collusion with government agencies to censor conservative platforms supports the idea that there was probably an organized corporate push to suppress the political opposition on YouTube as much as there was an effort to shut them down on social media.

The majority of conservative content creators understood that this was not about advertisers, it was about narratives.  The exploding popularity of gun channels runs contrary to the media assertion that American society is moving increasingly to the left.  And, even though gun channels mostly focus on firearms and instruction, they also promoted conservative and constitutional values which represent a thorn in the side of the establishment.

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Google Plans New Content-Scanning Censorship Tech

Earlier in the year, Google filed an application to patent new methods, systems, and media for what the giant calls “identifying videos containing objectionable content” that are uploaded to a social site or video service.

For example, YouTube – though the filing doesn’t explicitly name this platform.

The patent application, which has just been published this month, is somewhat different from other automated “methods and systems” Google and other giants, notably Microsoft, already have to power their censorship apparatus; with this one, the focus is more on how AI can be added to the mix.

More and more often, various countries are introducing censorship laws where the speed at which content is removed or accounts blocked is a major requirement made of social media companies. Google could have this in mind when the patent’s purpose is said to be to improve on detecting objectionable content quickly, “for potential removal.”

No surprise here, but what should be the key question – namely, what is considered as “objectionable content” – is less of a definition and more a list that can be further expanded, variously interpreted, etc., and the list includes such items as violence, pornography, objectionable language, animal abuse, and then the cherry on top – “and/or any other type of objectionable content.”

The filing details how Google’s new system works, and we equally unsurprisingly learn that AI here means machine learning (ML) and neural networks. This technology is supposed to mimic the human brain but comes down to a series of equations, differentiated from ordinary algorithms by “learning” about what an image (or a video in this case) is, pixel by pixel.

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