Tag: social media

Facebook designates Grayzone journalist Kit Klarenberg a ‘dangerous individual’

The notoriously intelligence-friendly social media network appears to have imposed a ban on posting a recent report by Kit Klarenberg, and is automatically restricting users who re-publish his work.

Multiple Facebook users have reported being banned, or having their posts censored, after sharing an investigation by The Grayzone’s Kit Klarenberg into CIA and MI6 involvement in the creation of ISIS. Readers who post links to the piece on the social network find themselves frozen out of their accounts, on the apparent grounds that Facebook has classified Klarenberg as a “dangerous individual.”

“I just shared this article from @Kit Klarenberg on Facebook and the post was immediately deleted,” wrote Ricky Hale, the founder of popular independent left-wing outlet Council Estate Media.

In a Substack article published April 5, Hale wrote that “the page was hit with restrictions and I was told I had shared a post from a dangerous individual or organisation.”

Hale was only able to regain control of his Facebook page, which boasts over 44,000 fans, by removing administrative privileges from the user who shared it — which happens to be himself.

Other restrictions imposed due to sharing Klarenberg’s work have not been lifted, and may well never be. Hale says he has been blocked from changing the page’s name, inviting people to join the page, or creating new Facebook groups. “Given Facebook had already reduced my page’s visibility for another absurd violation, I’m assuming my posts are going to be invisible,” Hale lamented. “This means a Facebook page with 44,000 users has been rendered useless because of state censorship that’s been outsourced to big tech. This is not how a free society operates.”

It was not the first time that Facebook censored one of its users for posting Klarenberg’s article. Hours beforehand, another social media user revealed the piece had been removed from her Facebook timeline mere “seconds” after it was posted.

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Telegram Founder Reveals US Government’s Alleged Covert Maneuvers to Backdoor The App

What a shocker. Is this really newsworthy? Actually yes – because here, we’re seeing the opposite of clickbait – a subdued, to put it generously, headline in legacy US media, in an attempt to report about some of the things Telegram CEO Pavel Durov said during his interview with Tucker Carlson.

But behind this headline lies a pretty explosive, even if not surprising story – of how countries (in reality, more likely than one, but in this case, one is named) view the backbone of internet safety and integrity, namely – reliable, secure encryption.

Long story short – they view it as the enemy.

Durov, a Russian now in possession of multiple passports, based in Dubai, UAE, and often apparently butting heads with snooping efforts from governments (including Russian) revealed during the interview how the government in Washington one time tried to “break into Telegram,” as he put it.

But really, doing this successfully, given the nature of the encrypted app, would have meant not just breaking “into” – but, breaking Telegram.

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Colorado Senate Passes Bill That Could Ban Social Media Users Who Post Positively About Drugs—Including Legal Psychedelics

Colorado’s Senate has approved a sweeping social media bill that, among other provisions, could force platforms to ban users for talking positively online about certain controlled substances, such as state-legal psychedelics, certain hemp products and even some over-the-counter cough syrups.

The legislation, SB24-158—a broad proposal concerning internet age verification and content policies—would require social media platforms to immediately remove any user “who promotes, sells, or advertises an illicit substance.”

Initially that provision would have applied to all controlled substances under state law—including state-legal marijuana—but an amendment last month from the bill’s sponsor, Sen. Chris Hansen (D), includes language saying that “a social media platform may allow a user to promote, sell, or advertise medical marijuana or retail marijuana to users who are at least twenty-one years of age” so long as the content complies with state cannabis laws.

The amended legislation would still apply to numerous other legal and illegal substances.

On Wednesday, the Senate voted 30–1 to pass the revised measure on third reading, with four members excused.

Earlier this week, the Senate Appropriations Committee also adopted two amendments to the bill, including one adding staff funding for the state attorney general’s office and another that could make the act subject to voter approval in November.

Critics say even with the marijuana-related amendment, the bill could create major problems for users trying to post benign—and legal—content around substances like cough medicine.

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Big Brother in Training? How Proposed Legislation Might Pave the Way for Online Age Verification and Digital ID

Bipartisan legislative efforts are underway in the US House of Representatives to adopt new versions of two laws originally drawn up to deal with the safety of youth online.

But the fear is that the bills introduced now – H.R.7891, the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), and H.R. 7890, the Children and Teens Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) 2.0 – will facilitate implementation of a future sweeping age verification and digital ID push.

These concerns are raised because KOSA is directing the secretary of commerce, together with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to conduct a study “evaluating the most technologically feasible methods and options for developing systems to verify age at the device or operating system level.”

At this stage of the proceedings, the study will not be used to mandate that platforms implement “an age gating or age verification functionality” – however, once the authorities have at their disposal the technical solutions to do it, some observers expect it could be used for a more aggressive legislative push at the federal level later on.

The key difference between the existing Senate version of KOSA and the proposed House bill is found under the “care of duty” component, with the House text now defining that to apply to “high impact online companies” with $2.5 billion or more annual revenue, and 150+ million global monthly active users over at least three months of the preceding year.

The Senate version refers to platforms “reasonably likely to be used by a minor” (employing 500 or more people, with gross annual revenue of $50 million or more).

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French woman found dead in Italian church was searching for ghosts in possible Tik Tok stunt, police say

A 22-year-old French woman whose blood-drained body was found in an abandoned church in northern Italy’s Aosta Valley over the weekend had been looking for a haunted house believed to contain ghosts, according to police.

She told family members about her plans before leaving the village near Lyon where she lived, a police spokeswoman in the town of La Salle told CNN.

Police believe the victim could have been attempting to carry out a TikTok stunt, adding that her death could be related to a ghost hunting competition being played in France on the social media platform. The other working theories are that it was a “consented murder” or sacrifice, or an attempt to carry out a social media prank in the deconsecrated church. Police are still searching for a young man who was seen with her. There are also two other missing persons cases in the area which police say could be related.

According to the spokeswoman, the victim and a male friend had been seen in the area dressed “like vampires.” A witness interviewed by police say the young woman was pale and “emaciated” and the man had dark hair and olive skin. The witness told police investigators that she looked like a “walking corpse.”

The dead woman, whose name has not been released, had been stabbed with what investigators say was a camping knife and had bled to death, according to medical examiner Roberto Testi. She also had two gunshots to her neck and one to her abdomen that police say may have been inflicted after she died. Some of the blood had been scraped off the floor and removed from the crime scene, police told CNN. There were no signs of struggle, police say.

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Social Media Fact Checkers Claim Their Work Isn’t Censorship. Here’s Why It Is.

There’s good news, and bad: first, the fact that “fact-checkers” masquerading as unbiased and accurate moderators of content – while actually unreliable and bias-prone tools of censorship – are now recognized widely enough as just that, to trigger a reaction from some prominent actors.

But then – these “fact-checkers” are reacting in order to double down on their role as something positive, and justified.

Because there are no facts to support this attitude, one of the key “fact-checkers” is hiding behind an opinion piece. But the claim is there: “Fact-checking is not censorship,” a post on Poynter wants you to believe.

This, despite the organization, which acts to “certify fact-checkers” via the International Fact-Checking Network (IFCN), having a project that has resulted in mass suppression of posts on Facebook.

According to Facebook (Meta) CEO Mark Zuckerberg, posts that get fact-checked experience a 95% drop in clicks. In other words, even if this content is not outright removed, it is made virtually invisible. That’s censorship by any other name.

So how in the world can Poynter claim that activities of those it certifies actually result in “adding to the public debate” rather than suppressing it?

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Brazilian Censorship Scandal: Twitter Files Shows How Government and Big Tech Silence Dissent

The latest development in the Twitter Files suggests that a concerted initiative backed by the Brazilian government is threatening freedom of speech across the globe in coordination with various high-profile tech companies. According to the allegations brought forth by investigative journalist Michael Shellenberger, former Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s supporters are specifically in the crosshairs of this extensive campaign.

At the helm of this scheme, as Shellenberger suggests, is Alexandre de Moraes, the superior electoral court’s chief and a participant in Supreme court proceedings and someone whose push for censorship has been documented heavily.

He is purportedly leading a combined legislative and judicial endeavor to stifle political dissent. Shellenberger unveils some quite disturbing actions allegedly enforced by de Moraes, including imprisoning individuals sans trial for content shared on the web, the requirement of user-removal from social media sites and specific content censorship without the ability to appeal or access evidence produced against them.

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Censorship on Trial at the Supreme Court

Billed as one of the most consequential lawsuits of the last century, Murthy v. Missouri (formerly Missouri v Biden) is a legal battle that stands at the intersection of free speech protections and social media companies. 

The plaintiffs, which include psychiatrist Aaron Kheriaty, and epidemiologists Martin Kulldorff and Jay Bhattacharya, cosignatories of the Great Barrington Declaration, allege the US government coerced social media companies to censor disfavoured viewpoints that were constitutionally protected by the First Amendment.

The US government denies coercing social media companies, arguing it was “friendly encouragement” in an effort to protect Americans from “misinformation” in a public health emergency.

The Constitution is clear – it forbids the US government from abridging free speech. But a private company such as a social media platform bears no such burden and is not ordinarily constrained by the First Amendment.

This case asks whether certain government officials impermissibly coerced social media companies to violate the First Amendment rights of social media users. The case now sits before the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS).

The Case So Far

The case has seen several twists and turns since it was originally filed in 2022.

Discovery allowed plaintiffs to document nearly 20,000 pages showing platforms like Twitter (now X), Facebook, YouTube, and Google stifled free speech by removing or downgrading stories about Hunter Biden’s laptop, the 2020 presidential election, and various Covid-19 policies.

The plaintiffs described it as an “unprecedented, sprawling federal censorship enterprise.”

On July 4, 2023, US District Court Terry Doughty granted a motion to restrict federal government officials from communicating with social media companies over content it believed to be misinformation.

Specifically, they were prohibited from meeting or contacting by phone, email, or text message or “engaging in any communication of any kind with social-media companies urging, encouraging, pressuring, or inducing in any manner for removal, deletion, suppression, or reduction of content containing protected free speech.”

Doughty indicated there was “substantial evidence” that the US government violated the First Amendment by engaging in a widespread censorship campaign and that “if the allegations made by plaintiffs are true, the present case arguably involves the most massive attack against free speech in United States’ history.”

The Biden Administration appealed the decision in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, arguing that the officials exercised a form of permissible government speech because they only pointed out content that violated the platforms’ policies to reduce the harms of online misinformation.

On September 8, 2023, the Fifth Circuit largely affirmed Judge Doughty’s order stating that US government officials were engaging “in a broad pressure campaign designed to coerce social-media companies into suppressing speakers, viewpoints, and content disfavored by the government.”

It was determined that the harms of such censorship radiated far beyond the plaintiffs in the case, essentially impacting every social-media user.

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CIVIL RIGHTS GROUPS DECRY PROPOSED FEDERAL PRISON SOCIAL MEDIA CRACKDOWN

Two civil rights groups castigated the federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) this week for a proposed crackdown on imprisoned peoples’ access to social media—including a possible ban on accounts run by family on the outside. The two organizations, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University (KFAI), said the BOP’s suggested new procedures would violate basic civil rights and run afoul of the U.S. Constitution.

To change administrative policies, federal agencies must submit written proposals to the federal register and allow for public comment. In a proposed rule published on Feb. 2, the BOP floats a series of changes to “inmate discipline regulations,” including stricter bans on possessing hazardous tools, escaping from prison, or encouraging others to engage in work strikes. But multiple sections pertaining to the use of social media particularly caught the eye of First Amendment defenders. 

If enacted, one measure would ban “accessing, using, or maintaining social media, or directing others to establish or maintain social media accounts on the inmate’s behalf.” As it stands, many incarcerated people either access social media on tablets or contraband devices or send information to loved ones to post. Many state prison systems already ban imprisoned people from accessing social media and a handful of states, including Alabama and Iowa, ban third parties from posting on prisoners’ behalf.

Violating the new federal code would be considered a “High Severity Level” incident, which could bring a host of punishments, including solitary confinement, damage to parole eligibility, or fines.

Another proposal would label the use of social media to commit “criminal acts,” as well as the use of money-transfer apps such as CashApp, as “Greatest Severity Level” prohibited acts, the most severe offensive level. 

“When inmates use these services to send and receive money, Bureau staff are unable to monitor those transfers,” the proposal says. “CashApp and similar applications employ encryption technology that enables inmates to avoid detection, allowing them to use these platforms for unlawful purposes such as money laundering.”

The period for public comment closed on April 1. The federal register website shows that the proposed rule received 219 comments, though only 22 have been posted online.

In a six-page rebuttal submitted Monday, KFAI attorneys said a blanket social media crackdown would likely violate the Constitution.

“For the nearly 2 million people who are incarcerated in U.S. jails and prisons, maintaining connection with loved ones and communities is associated with better physical and mental health outcomes, reduced recidivism, and successful reentry into society,” wrote attorneys Jennifer Jones, Nicole Mo, and Stephanie Krent. “Social media is increasingly becoming an important part of that connection. As one formerly incarcerated journalist recently recounted, using social media through his wife allowed him to pursue a writing career, stay in touch with his community, and give him hope of reintegration upon release.”

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Irish Government Wants Pre-Election Pact With Tech Giants To Counter Online “Disinformation”

Many governments around the world are no longer at least pretending they don’t see Big Tech as a major political asset, or that they will not try to use that asset to their advantage. Instead, this behavior is slowly being normalized – albeit always qualified as a democracy-preserving, rather than undermining policy.

In other words, something driven by the need to combat “disinformation” and not what critics suspect it is – the need to harness and control the massive reach, influence, and power of major social platforms.

Judging by reports out of Ireland, it is among those countries, with big words like “supercharged disinformation threats to democracy” flying around as the government looks to use what some might call “supercharged fearmongering” to secure no less than a “pre-election pact with tech giants.”

Some of this is yet to be enacted through the Electoral Reform Act, so in the meanwhile Big Tech representatives have been summoned to a meeting, via lobbyists representing them, Technology Ireland, to discuss the said “threats.”

The Electoral Reform Act is supposed to formalize new rules for both platforms and those buying ads, while during the meeting, set to take place in late April, tech companies will be expected to sign “the Irish Election Integrity Accord.”

A letter signed by Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien and Minister of State Malcolm Noonan explained that the Accord will be new, but based on the Electoral Reform Act from 2022, and always focusing on “disinformation,” and advertising. What the giants are expected to sign up to is “a set of principles for the sector and the state to work by to safeguard our democracy over these crucial next few months.”

The Accord appears to have been put together to bridge the gap between the time of campaigning and elections, and the full enactment of the Electoral Reform Act, envisaged to complement and “reaffirm” similar legislation in the EU and member countries.

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