Election - Page 2 of 6

Twitter will label COVID-19 vaccine misinformation and enforce a strike system

Twitter announced Monday that it will start labeling tweets that share misleading information about COVID-19 vaccines. The labels will include links to relevant information from official bodies like the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Twitter plans to enforce a five-strike system for repeat offenders that can lead to locked accounts and permanent suspension.

The new labels are similar to Facebook’s anti-misinformation banners or the labels Twitter began deploying early in the pandemic. They appear as text underneath misleading tweets, with links to information from official sources or Twitter’s rules. Twitter says it applies these labels through a combination of human and automated review systems and is starting its rollout with English-language content first.

An example of a labeled tweet.

Image: Twitter

Twitter has specific criteria for labeling in its COVID-19 misleading information policy, but generally, the company targets five categories of false or misleading information:

Misinformation about the nature of the virus
Misinformation about the efficacy of treatments and preventive measures
Misinformation about regulations, restrictions, and exemptions in association with health advisories
Misinformation about the prevalence of the virus and the risk of infection or death
Misleading affiliations (for example, claiming to be a doctor or public health official)

Labels also feed into the new strike system for COVID-19 misinformation. A harmful, labeled tweet counts as one strike. If Twitter determines the misinformation is particularly dangerous in its questioning of COVID-19 treatments and invokes a larger conspiracy connected to the virus (like the idea that vaccines include microchips for tracking people), the company may also delete the tweet, which counts as two strikes. From there, account-level strikes accrue, triggering different actions from Twitter.

Appending labels has been part of the larger strategy to fight misinformation Twitter used during the 2020 election, adding labels to tweets from politicians — including the former president — when they included inaccurate information. While the labels seem helpful, they don’t necessarily deter people from sharing the information. Holding real punishment like a suspension until there have been five bad tweets also means that misinformation could spread with only some text as a warning.

You can see Twitter’s various punishments for the different number of strikes below:

One strike: no account-level action
Two strikes: 12-hour account lock
Three strikes: 12-hour account lock
Four strikes: 7-day account lock
Five or more strikes: permanent suspension

Medium union effort stalls, falling one vote short of majority

The Medium Workers Union is pausing organizing efforts after it failed to win a simple majority of support in an online vote last Friday.

“This election did not have the outcome we hoped for, but we’re not going anywhere,” the union said in a statement. “The vote was never to decide whether our union exists, but whether management would recognize us as a bargaining unit.”

The final tally was 75 yes votes, 68 votes for no, and seven abstentions, putting the organizers just one vote short of the previously agreed threshold of 76 yes votes. Notably, organizers believe these same votes would allow them to win recognition in a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) election due to abstention rules, which would give them 52 percent of the total votes cast. However, the union is abiding by its previous agreement with management and counting the tally as a loss.

The union can hold another third-party election at any time, although it says it is pausing organizing efforts for the moment. It has also made it clear that it does not plan to move forward with an NLRB election in the immediate future.

“Medium’s CEO Ev Williams has said leadership will continue to speak with workers directly to listen to their concerns, regardless of the election’s outcome,” the union said. They noted Williams also promised not to retaliate against organizers.

In a statement emailed to The Verge, a Medium spokesperson said: “We will respect our employees’ collective decision and the election’s outcome. We will also continue to listen to and speak with employees directly so we can quickly address concerns, continue to adapt, and together, build a successful company.”

The Medium Workers Union declined to comment further on the election outcome.

President Biden denounces ‘anti-union propaganda’ amid Amazon union vote

On Sunday night, President Joe Biden released a message of support for unionizing Amazon workers in Alabama, while sternly denouncing anti-union efforts by employers. The message comes in the midst of a contentious union election at an Amazon warehouse in Bessemer. And while Biden stopped short of an explicit endorsement of the fledgling Bessemer union, he was broadly enthusiastic about the benefits of collective bargaining.

“I made it clear during my campaign that my policy would be to support unions organizing and the right to collectively bargain,” Biden said in the statement. “I’m keeping that promise.”

It’s rare for a sitting president to publicly support a union drive, and the statement is careful not to direct workers to vote in favor of unionization, as such statements might violate labor law. Biden never names Amazon directly in the statement, although he does directly name Alabama warehouse workers. He also denounces anti-union efforts in a way many will see as aimed at the company.

“There should be no intimidation,” Biden says in the video, “no coercion, no threats, no anti-union propaganda.”

The Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union (RWDSU), which is organizing the Bessemer worksite, applauded the statement. “As President Biden points out, the best way for working people to protect themselves and their families is by organizing into unions,” said RWDSU president Stuart Appelbaum in a statement. “And that is why so many working women and men are fighting for a union at the Amazon facility in Bessemer, Alabama.”

Amazon has been aggressive in its efforts to prevent the warehouse from unionizing, inundating Alabama workers with text messages and worksite posters warning of the downsides of unionization. Last week, workers spotted anti-union ads running on Amazon-owned Twitch, although Twitch withdrew the ads once their existence was made public. In another incident, Amazon worked with county officials to alter the timing on a stoplight near the warehouse, making it harder for organizers to approach workers as they left the site.

In some instances, those efforts have provoked a backlash against the company. Last week, Amazon’s VP overseeing labor and employment law abruptly resigned from the American Constitution Society, a liberal legal group that had recently appointed him to a three-year term. A coalition of members had called for his resignation in December, citing Amazon’s response to a walkout at a Staten Island warehouse last year.

Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Vaccine centers embrace stickers and selfie stations

The best picture I’ve seen this week was a selfie from my father-in-law who just got his first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine. Along with the shot, they gave him a sticker that says “I got vaccinated!”

As the vaccine rollout continues, clinics and distribution centers across the country are embracing things like stickers and even selfie stations decked out with colorful backgrounds to help people celebrate getting the shot.

The selfie stations are set up as colorful backgrounds, often with pro-vaccine messaging tiled with the name of the healthcare provider. It’s good branding. And hey, if social media-friendly backgrounds helped make some trendy restaurants popular, there’s no reason they couldn’t work for vaccine sites too.

Added bonus — if the vaccines are being given in a healthcare setting, it gives people a designated space to take pictures without compromising other patients’ privacy.

Vaccine stickers and selfies can increase confidence in vaccines. Just like “I voted” stickers were designed to remind people about Election Day, “I got vaccinated” stickers are designed to help people see the vaccination efforts unfolding in their own community.

Back in December, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention developed stickers for healthcare workers to wear after they got vaccinated. Since they were some of the first people in the country to get vaccinated, the stickers were an easy way for workers to start conversations about the vaccines with their patients and colleagues — some of whom might be reluctant to get the vaccine.

The ready-made vaccination celebrations are also a way to dissuade people from sharing their vaccine cards on social media. Those can contain personal information, and posting photos of them can help scammers scam. A photo of your vaccinated self sporting a sticker, on the other hand, does not pose nearly as much of a privacy risk.

Stickers can serve the same purpose outside of the healthcare industry too. But also; they’re super fun. Slapping on a sticker is a chance to visually celebrate in a time when there’s been so little for us to enjoy. So is taking a selfie to share with the world. Sure, there are public health benefits to making vaccination visible. It’s also pure joy.

How do we say thank you to the health workers and scientists for their sacrifice and service? Receive the vaccine as soon as one can to lessen their load and keep wearing a mask to protect fellow citizens. In my 80th year, I am grateful and hopeful for better days ahead. pic.twitter.com/emGDlnYL2E

— Patrick Stewart (@SirPatStew) January 22, 2021

I’m not eligible to receive the vaccine yet where I am, and I probably won’t be for a long time. But after seeing so much death and suffering during the past year, it brings me nothing but hope and happiness to see the relief in people’s eyes after they get their shot.

Other people have been taking their vaccine celebrations into their own hands. Not content with the official offerings, they’re dressing in their best, donning sequins, and even bringing fun bandages to patch themselves up after the shot. Vaccinated people can’t throw a big maskless party yet — but they can celebrate a small, momentous victory. It’s fantastic.

There are still too few people vaccinated, here in the US and around the world. The rollout has been messy, and frustrating and inequitable. It still is. Governments can still do much better. But more people are getting the shot every day. In fact, Friday set vaccination records in the US and EU.

Without a doubt, that’s something to celebrate.

Here’s what else happened this week.

Research

The coronavirus is threatening a comeback. Here’s how to stop it.

Vaccination numbers are rising, but so are coronavirus variants. The pandemic isn’t over yet, but there are ways to make this next phase better than the last. (Apoorva Mandivalli / The New York Times)

Coronavirus reinfection will soon become our reality

As the virus evolves and time goes on, it’s likely that we’ll see more re-infections of the coronavirus. Here’s how that might work. (Katherine J. Wu / The Atlantic)

Coronavirus spreads readily in gyms when people don’t wear masks

A new CDC report this week looked at COVID-19 outbreaks connected to gyms. They found that indoor fitness classes that did not require people to wear masks allowed the virus to spread easily. (Amina Kahn/The Los Angeles Times)

Development

Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine backed by independent FDA committee

A single-shot vaccine got a unanimous green light from an FDA committee on Friday. The meeting came after an FDA report issued earlier this week confirmed Johnson and Johnson’s conclusions about their vaccine. (Nicole Wetsman / The Verge)

Moderna ready to test version of COVID-19 vaccine aimed at worrisome variant

Moderna is preparing to test a version of their vaccine that directly targets a particular strain of the virus. The company’s existing vaccine doesn’t work as well against this variant, so they’re developing a new version. (Damian Garde and Matthew Herper / STAT)

The growing evidence that the COVID-19 vaccines can reduce transmission, explained

When they were testing vaccines, companies looked to see if the vaccines could keep people from getting sick. And all authorized vaccines do a great job at keeping people out of the hospital and alive. But the big clinical trials weren’t designed to look at how well they can keep people from passing the disease from one person to another. It’s a big question, and one that researchers (and everyone else) is eager to uncover. (Kelsey Piper / Vox)

Perspectives

In every volunteer opportunity I’d ever been a part of, you made camp friends, formed quick alliances. To do so that day, when you even didn’t know who had been vaccinated and who hadn’t, felt aggressive and dangerous. Even holding the door open for the person behind you on the orientation tour could violate the required distance. I couldn’t discreetly murmur to my shift buddy about who was trying to cut and who was about to get out of hand.

— Irin Carmon writes about her experience as a COVID vaccine site bouncer in Brooklyn for Intelligencer.

More than Numbers

To the more than 113,507,393 people worldwide who have tested positive, may your road to recovery be smooth.

To the families and friends of the 2,519,257 people who have died worldwide — 510,467 of those in the US — your loved ones are not forgotten.

Stay safe, everyone.

Facebook will add a new label to some climate change posts in the UK

Facebook will start labeling posts about climate change with a banner that directs people to its information page on climate change. It’s the company’s latest effort to weed out lies and myths about the climate crisis, and it follows criticism from lawmakers and scientists concerned that the social media giant allowed false information to proliferate on its platform.

For now, the labels will only appear on Facebook posts in the UK. But the company plans to start rolling them out elsewhere “soon,” it said in an announcement on Thursday. Facebook debuted its “Climate Science Information Center” in the US, Germany, the UK, and France back in September. Now, Facebook is also expanding that page to include new information debunking common myths about climate change.

The company’s strategy for tackling climate misinformation is similar to what it’s done about COVID-19. Facebook started putting vetted information about the novel coronavirus at the top of its news feed last March.

Facebook came under a lot of pressure last year to do a better job at fact-checking posts about climate change and stop misleading content from spreading. The new labels seem to be one way to answer calls for Facebook to take more action, although it doesn’t address original concerns that legislators like Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) had about Facebook last year.

The whole saga started in August 2019 after Facebook reversed a decision by its fact-checkers to rate an op-ed as “false” for including inaccurate information and cherry-picked data on climate change. E&E News consequently reported that Facebook had created a sort of loophole that exempted opinion articles from fact checking. That’s been a part of its policy the entire time, spokespeople for Facebook have told The Verge and The New York Times.

“The future of our planet is at stake, and there should be no company too big, too powerful, and too opaque to be held accountable for its role in the climate crisis. Facebook is no exception,” Warren and other senators said in a statement last year.

Warren and others demanded that Facebook answer questions about its fact-checking policies. In a letter from Facebook shared exclusively with The Verge last year, the company maintained that “clear opinion content” wasn’t typically subject to fact-checking on their platform. It also said that “speech from politicians” was not eligible to be fact-checked in an email to The Verge last year.

Facebook hasn’t specified how it will decide which posts should carry the new “informational labels” launching in the UK today. “We’re continuing to learn from other informational labels that we’ve applied to COVID-19 posts and posts during the US election,” a Facebook spokesperson said in an email.

Amazon changed traffic light timing during union drive, county officials say

As part of its ongoing fight over an Alabama warehouse’s efforts to unionize, Amazon reportedly changed the timing of a traffic light outside the warehouse, according to reporting by More Perfect Union. Union organizers at the site had previously accused the company of altering the timing so that pro-union workers would not be able to canvass workers while stopped at the light.

Until recently, the altered timing on the traffic light outside the factory had been dismissed as a rumor. But More Perfect Union confirmed with Jefferson County officials that last year, Amazon notified the county of traffic delays during shift changes and asked for the light to be changed. On December 15th, the county increased the green light duration in an effort to clear workers off the worksite faster. There’s no indication that the county was aware of the ongoing organizing drive or any effect the traffic light changes might have on the effort.

NEWS: A Jefferson County public official has confirmed that Amazon asked for the traffic light patterns to be altered outside its Alabama warehouse.

— More Perfect Union (@MorePerfectUS) February 16, 2021

Workers at the Bessemer warehouse began their union election on February 8th, seeking to form a union under the Retail, Warehouse and Department Store Union (RWDSU) after months of organizing. Amazon has vigorously contested the effort, posting anti-unionization flyers throughout the factory, most noticeably in the bathroom. In advance of the official vote, workers also received a flood from Amazon warning of potentially negative consequences from unionization.

“I have never seen Amazon fight for something like this,” one longtime Amazon employee told The Verge previously, describing the flood of anti-union messaging. “I have never seen them try to push for something this hard before.”

The traffic light is significant for organizers because of the significant rules about how and where organizers can approach employees under US labor law. Employers like Amazon retain the right to restrict non-work conversations, and non-employees are generally not allowed on the worksite during shift hours. As a result, liminal spaces like the public street outside the worksite are often important venues for organizers seeking to raise awareness about a union drive.

Amazon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Can anyone moderate podcasts?

Illustration by William Joel / The Verge

Apple, Spotify, and the impossible problem of moderating shows

When former White House adviser-turned-podcaster Steve Bannon called for the beheading of Dr. Anthony Fauci and FBI director Christopher Wray, the tech platforms reacted. Twitter, YouTube, and Spotify all banned him and his podcast relatively quickly, cutting off access to their millions of users. Apple Podcasts, however, took a different stance. The most popular podcast app let his show stay live in its directory so that, months later, when Bannon encouraged his listeners to converge on the Capitol to protest election results, people still had an easy way to access his thoughts. His show, even this week, ranks among Apple Podcast’s top 20 news podcasts.

A story from ProPublica in January pointed out the dangers of not moderating someone like Bannon. It’s reasonable to want Apple to not benefit from clearly harmful voices, but the incident speaks to how unprepared the podcast industry is to moderate: companies face huge challenges in even finding infringing content, and there’s little to no transparency from the big players in how they monitor the listings in their apps. Plus, people in the space have real, philosophical concerns about the extent to which podcasting’s open ecosystem should be policed.

A disparate network of companies makes up the podcasting world, including apps, hosting services, sales teams, and networks. Moderation will need to happen across these companies to be effective, and in this current moment, that effort doesn’t work the way it does at tech monoliths like Facebook, Twitter, or YouTube, which can remove someone with a push of a button. Put simply, podcasting isn’t ready for full-scale, widespread moderation — if that’s even what the industry wants.

“There’s no podcasting company that has the scale, or the reach, or the resources, to be able to do anything like [that],” says Owen Grover, the former CEO of Pocket Casts, when asked whether he thinks the podcasting ecosystem could monitor shows like Facebook does the posts, images, and videos on its platform. “If the podcasting industry cares about this stuff … it’s going to require multiple organizations that exist across the industry value chain.”

Moderation isn’t a simple task, and even platforms like Facebook and Twitter routinely get it wrong. Audio presents an even tougher challenge. For one, new content rapidly streams into the space. A report published this month from podcast marketing company Chartable says 17,000 shows launch weekly, and to moderate them would mean scanning audio, whether that be with actual human ears, transcripts, or software, and then discerning whether they cross the line. This assumes the companies in the space even care to moderate.

“It’s quite hard to do it at scale,” says Mike Kadin, founder and CEO of the podcast hosting platform RedCircle. “We would have to transcribe everything, maybe, and apply some automated filters to look at everything. A: that’s expensive, and B: even if we could get everything in text, I don’t think a computer can understand the nuance of some of these issues, so it’s super challenging, and we do the best we can.”

Even in high-profile moments, the industry has been slow and inconsistent about moderation. It should have been easy to ban shows from the notorious conspiracy theorist Alex Jones in 2018, for example, but it took weeks to build out even an incomplete blockade across the industry. Spotify started out by removing specific episodes, with Apple Podcasts removing his shows a week later. After that point, a constellation of smaller podcast apps made their own decisions on whether Jones deserved a ban.

These efforts didn’t even remove the podcasts entirely. The Alex Jones Show is still available today on Google Podcasts and smaller apps like Castbox, and the open nature of RSS means you can still listen to his shows inside of Apple Podcasts and other apps where it’s banned if you seek it out.

All of which is to say, one of the most high-profile podcast deplatforming incidents wasn’t even wholly effective, which doesn’t bode well for a future of podcast moderation in which people want apps to take a heavier hand. Now, QAnon podcasts are flourishing on at least one hosting platform, Podbean, which also hosts Bannon’s podcast, and outright fraud has occurred on Apple’s podcast charts. Copycat podcasts have also sprung up on Anchor, Spotify’s podcast creation software. The industry isn’t catching every show that passes through its systems, meaning the problematic programming lives on until someone points it out, forcing the companies to respond. In other cases, the apps and hosting providers either struggle to find these programs or don’t care enough to bother with them.

This speaks to the core of podcasting’s moderation issues, and the industry’s selling point for many: its open nature. Podcasts are distributed through RSS feeds, which are essentially a link to a list of episodes. Most apps (apart from Spotify, Audible, and Amazon Music) effectively serve as search engines for these feeds. As long as a show is hosted online somewhere, it can generally show up in these apps when someone searches for it. Apple, in particular, plays an integral role in the space because it gives smaller podcast apps the ability to incorporate its catalog, meaning Apple’s moderation decisions ripple throughout the industry.

But because the ecosystem is diffuse and multiple podcast indexes exist, most companies end up having to make moderation decisions themselves. The teams’ jobs become easier if a particular program gains the mainstream media’s attention — as Jones’ did — because the team then knows what they’re looking for. But doing their own, preemptive moderation work is tough, if not nearly impossible because day-to-day operations often involve small groups with limited resources.

One podcast app creator, Xavier Guillemane, who made the popular Android podcast player Podcast Addict, says he fills his catalog with shows both from Apple Podcasts and The Podcast Index, a podcast search engine. He relies on user reports for moderation, and if he receives a report, he first checks Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts to see if the show is listed there.

“If it is then it means that the content does not violate their content policies,” he says over email. “If not, then I make sure that this podcast isn’t visible in any popular / suggested lists. That’s all I can do for moderation as I’m developing this app alone. With more than 2 million podcasts available, and with podcasts available in every language, there’s nothing more I can do.”

Grover echoed this idea, saying user reports were mainly how Pocket Casts policed its catalog. Those reports weren’t always reliable, however. “Signals from listeners are not always a good way to go because I will tell you that the whole notion of libertarian, do not censor — these things are powerful currents inside of podcasting,” he says, adding that many users saw the Jones removal as censorship.

Apple and Spotify, the two largest podcast players, each have their own set of community guidelines. Both platforms don’t allow content that encourages violence, for example, or shows that infringe on copyright. Spotify even specifically prohibits programs that promote pyramid schemes, while Apple doesn’t allow Nazi propaganda “as restricted by local law.” Like most terms, though, it’s hard to grasp how moderation would work in practice, and both companies are cagey about how exactly they moderate.

Spotify, which also owns one of the biggest podcast hosting platforms, Megaphone, issued a statement for this story saying Spotify uses a “variety of algorithmic and human detection measures to ensure that content on our platform is in keeping with our long-standing policies.” Apple Podcasts spokesperson Zach Kahn declined to comment.

Beyond the listening apps, podcast hosting platforms, like Podbean, also play a key role in moderation. While they don’t necessarily care about distribution, they’re the ones keeping podcasts live and available. In the past, hosting services haven’t been at the center of the moderation debate, but when Amazon Web Services booted Parler, a chat app known for far-right material, off its servers, it emphasized the critical role these hosts play. Podcast hosting platforms have a particular incentive to moderate when they help shows make money, or sell ads for them, because brands generally don’t want to advertise on a controversial show. Otherwise, the hosting platforms don’t have much reason to rein in their own customers.

At RedCircle, the team needs to moderate because it monetizes its users’ shows, but because the company only employs 11 people, Kadin says they can’t listen to or check out every program that joins the hosting service. Instead, the team reviews the shows that are the most popular each week to make sure they’re within the company’s content guidelines, including copyright, and also to ensure they’re receiving proper account support from RedCircle. Meanwhile, Spreaker, a company that’s now owned by iHeartMedia, uses algorithms and a 10-person team to review shows, says Andrea De Marsi, the company’s COO. They mostly focus on the shows that Spreaker monetizes through its advertiser marketplace and try to avoid taking sides on political rhetoric, so long as a podcaster doesn’t say or do anything illegal.

RedCircle says it’s caught some issues itself, like a neo-Nazi podcast that employed obvious imagery while Spreaker has removed dangerous propaganda creators, like ISIS, because of reports they received from law enforcement agencies.

Even Podiant, a podcast hosting platform that prominently advertises itself as a team of “compassionate liberals,” doesn’t have the bandwidth to screen new customers and mostly monitors shows based on user reports. “It’s a really tricky task, especially at the hosting level,” says Podiant founder Mark Steadman.

Acast, another major hosting provider, says it’ll soon be publishing community guidelines for its service.

“This topic is something Acast takes very seriously, and we know we have a responsibility to constantly learn and work on new ways to support podcasters, listeners and advertisers alike,” says Susie Warhurst, SVP of content at Acast in an email statement.

Ultimately, It’s the bigger companies that will have the most say in how moderation happens in podcasting. But because of the system’s open nature, there’s only so far the biggest company, Apple, can go in policing its platform. Asking it to remove a show from its directory is like asking it to make a specific webpage inaccessible in Safari — is that something people want? Podcasting has, so far, avoided crowning one platform as king, meaning anyone, both on the creator and business side, can enter the space and possibly find success in it. That’s what makes podcasting great, even if it requires unclear answers on moderation.

Facebook has doubled bullying and harassment takedowns since last year

On Thursday, Facebook released a new moderation transparency report showing a marked uptick in bullying and harassment enforcement, which reached a peak of 6.3 million total takedowns through the last quarter of 2020. It’s an increase from 3.5 million pieces last quarter and 2.8 million in the fourth quarter of 2019. The company said much of the change is due to improvements in the automated systems that analyze Facebook and Instagram comments.

Facebook’s latest transparency report covers October to December 2020, a period that includes the US presidential election. During that time, the main Facebook network removed more harassment, organized hate and hate speech, and suicide and self-harm content. Instagram saw significant jumps in bullying and self-harm removals. The company says its numbers were shaped by two factors: more human review capacity and improvements in artificial intelligence, especially for non-English posts.

The company also indicates it will lean on automation to address a growing amount of video and audio on its platforms, including a rumored Clubhouse competitor. “We’re investing in technology across all the different sorts of ways that people share,” said CTO Mike Schroepfer on a call with reporters. “We understand audio, video, we understand the content around those things, who shared it, and build a broader picture of what’s happening there.” Facebook hasn’t confirmed the existence of a Clubhouse-like audio platform, but “I think there’s a lot we’re doing here that can apply to these different formats, and we obviously look at how the products are changing and invest ahead of those changes to make sure we have the technological tools we need,” he said.

Facebook pushed some moderation teams back into offices in early October; although it said in November that most moderators worked remotely, it’s also said that some sensitive content can’t be reviewed from home. Now, the company says increased moderation has helped Facebook and Instagram remove more suicide and self-injury posts. Facebook removed 2.5 million pieces of violating content, compared to 1.3 million pieces the preceding quarter, and Instagram removed 3.4 million pieces, up from 1.3 million. That’s comparable to pre-pandemic levels for Facebook, and it’s a significant absolute increase for Instagram.

Facebook bullying and harassment takedowns between Q3 2018 and Q4 2020.

Conversely, Facebook attributes some increases to AI-powered moderation. It removed 6.3 million pieces of bullying and harassing content on Facebook, for instance, which is nearly double the numbers from previous quarters. On Instagram, it removed 5 million pieces of content, up from 2.6 million pieces last quarter and 1.5 million pieces at the end of 2019. Those increases stem from tech that better analyzes comments in the context of the accompanying post.

Non-English language moderation has been a historic weak point for Facebook, and the company says it has improved AI language detection in Arabic, Spanish, and Portuguese, fueling a hate speech takedown increase from 22.1 million to 26.9 million pieces. That’s not as big as the jump Facebook saw in late 2019, however, when it made what it described as dramatic improvements to its automated detection.

Facebook hate speech takedowns between Q4 2017 and Q4 2020.

Facebook says it’s changed its News Feed in ways that reduce the amount of hate speech and violent content people see. A survey of hate speech in the third quarter found that users averaged between 10 and 11 pieces of hate speech for every 10,000 pieces of content; in the fourth quarter, that dropped to seven or eight pieces. The company said it was still formulating responses to some suggestions from the Facebook Oversight Board, which released its first decisions last month.

As it did last quarter, Facebook suggested lawmakers could use its transparency report as the model for a legal framework. Facebook has supported changes to Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a broad liability shield that has come under fire from critics of social media. “We think that regulation would be a very good thing,” said Monika Bickert, VP of content policy.

However, Facebook has not backed a specific legislative proposal — including the SAFE TECH Act, a sweeping rollback proposed in Congress last week. “We remain committed to having this dialogue with everybody in the United States who is working on finding a way forward with regulation,” said Bickert. “We’ve obviously seen a number of proposals in this area, and we’ve seen different focuses from different people on the Hill in terms of what they want to pursue, and we want to make sure that we are part of all those conversations.”

YouTube has paid more than $30 billion to creators, artists, and others over the last three years

YouTube has paid out more than $30 billion to creators, artists, and media organizations over the last three years, according to a new letter published by CEO Susan Wojcicki.

In Wojcicki’s first letter to creators of 2021, the CEO spent some time addressing YouTube’s growth. The number of new channels that joined the company’s Partner Program, which allows creators to earn advertising revenue, more than doubled in 2020. YouTube also “contributed approximately $16 billion to the U.S. GDP in 2019, supporting the equivalent of 345,000 full time jobs,” according to an Oxford Economics report that Wojcicki highlights.

The letter also focuses on the work YouTube’s team still has in front of them. Mainly, transparency, especially where content strikes and advertising dollars are concerned. Wojcicki noted that at the “scale we operate, it’s hard for creators to keep up with changing Community Guidelines.”

Wojcicki’s letter states that YouTube wants to be better about communicating changes to avoid channel strikes. After three strikes within a 90-day period, a channel is terminated.

“In December, I spoke with creator Charlie White from the channel penguinz0 after he tweeted about being given a strike for an older video due to a new policy,” Wojcicki wrote. “We know this situation is similar to frustrations shared by other creators.”

One example that came up after the 2020 presidential election was YouTube’s decision to ban any videos that propelled misinformation about voter fraud. The new policy went into effect in December, but YouTube gave a grace period for creators to ensure none of their videos violated the new policies.

YouTube executives have also faced mounting pressure to do a better job of moderating the site and preventing misinformation from spreading. YouTube is now shifting its focus to vaccination misinformation. “We’re always working to strike the right balance between openness and responsibility as we meet the guidelines set by governments around the world,” Wojcicki wrote.

One other interesting part of Wojcicki’s letter was a focus on regulation. A recent hot topic in tech policy circles is reform of Section 230, which effectively allows social media platforms like YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter to operate without being liable for content people post. Wojcicki referred to Section 230 as an act that “enables us to both keep YouTube open and allow a large amount of content on the internet as well as take the actions necessary to protect our platform.” Although Wojcicki didn’t issue a stronger sentiment, she did bring up that the debate over Section 230 happening in Congress has caught the attention of creators like Hila and Ethan Klein.

Wojcicki’s full letter, which includes more details about creator revenue and an update on YouTube Shorts, the company’s answer to TikTok, can be read on Google’s blog.

Ministry of Justice rejects Scheuer's draft law on autonomous driving

The Federal Ministry of Justice has initially rejected a draft law by Transport Minister Andreas Scheuer (CSU) on autonomous driving because of open questions about data protection. This was reported by the Handelsblatt . A spokeswoman for Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) said on Wednesday (20. Jan. 2021) On request, high data protection standards for mobility data and clear liability regulations are central prerequisites from the Ministry’s point of view in order to create acceptance for new technologies and digital services in the transport sector among consumers.

Too little data protection and legal security In addition, the Ministry of Justice sees this as a necessary basic requirement, to create legal security for producers and supplying companies. From the Ministry’s point of view, a number of important questions still need to be clarified.

Like the Handelsblatt reported, the Ministry of Justice refused to give its approval mainly because, according to the draft, data such as routes should be able to be transmitted to the Office for the Protection of the Constitution or the Federal Criminal Police Office on request via the Federal Motor Transport Authority. The Ministry of Justice has identified a corresponding “data transfer regulation” in Scheuer’s legislative plans. The relevant regulations are to be “deleted”, officials of the ministry demanded.

“Blockade technology leadership” Criticism of the Federal Ministry of Justice came from North Rhine-Westphalia’s Transport Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU). “Federal Minister of Justice Christine Lambrecht has to take off the brake when driving autonomously,” said Wüst of the German Press Agency . “The blockade of the bill for robotic vehicles endangers German technology leadership and thus hundreds of thousands of jobs in the automotive industry. We cannot afford that. The federal government must not abandon its plan and must ensure that a law on autonomous driving is passed during this election period. ”

More and more stages of autonomous driving make traffic safer and smoother and thus also bring ecological advantages, according to Wüst. “They must not be sacrificed because of departmental vanities.”

With the law, Scheuer wants to enable autonomous vehicles to be able to drive on public roads in regular operation in the coming years. According to earlier statements by the minister, Germany should take a leading role internationally in autonomous driving.

(fpi)

Biden plans Inauguration Day Snapchat filter alongside locked-down live event

With an ongoing pandemic and an unprecedented lockdown of the nation’s capital, Joe Biden’s inauguration will look different from those that came before it.

The Biden inaugural committee has already planned a week of extensive televised events — like live performances from Lady Gaga and Fall Out Boy — but to try to recreate the camaraderie of a live event, the team has also come up with a new way for supporters to participate virtually.

On Wednesday, Biden’s team will launch a Snapchat filter that transports users to the Capitol to participate from home. Once the inaugural filter is selected in the Snapchat reel, users can take a selfie in front of the Capitol as confetti falls from above. If users flip the camera around, they’ll be greeted by a Biden Jumbotron in front of a crowd of inauguration attendees whose faces are selfies sent in by supporters online.

Biden’s Inauguration Day Snapchat filter in selfie mode.

The filter will play an exclusive message from Biden directly addressing Snapchatters. “Hey Snapchat!! It’s me, Joe. Welcome to inauguration!” he says.

The filter will also direct users who access it to a live stream of the inauguration event on Wednesday.

“This year’s inauguration has allowed us to create new, innovative, and creative tools for Americans across the country to participate in inaugural traditions and ceremonies while staying home to keep everyone safe,” said Christian Tom, digital director for the presidential inaugural committee. “We are excited for President-elect Biden to share his message around unifying the country with folks on Snapchat and invite them to be a part of this historic inaugural.”

Security measures have rendered traditional selfies impossible, as much of Washington, DC has been placed under lockdown in the wake of the Capitol riot. The FBI has warned of planned armed protests in the area, which encouraged the Department of Homeland Security to launch an inaugural security operation to keep the White House and Capitol safe through the inauguration events. Around 21,000 National Guard members will be in DC on Wednesday to help secure the event.

The inauguration Snapchat filter builds on the augmented reality tech Biden’s campaign used last year to get out the vote. In one filter ahead of Election Day, users could point their cameras at USPS mail boxes and receive directions on how to vote by mail. Last September, the Biden team put out merch for players of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, and later that fall designed an entire island in the game for players to visit.

“We hope this tool will bring the inaugural experience to young Americans wherever they are and share it with their friends and families,” Tom said in a statement about the upcoming filter.

The IETF network standardization committee elects German chairman for the first time

Lars Eggert becomes the new chairman of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). This is the first time that the most important standardization organization for the further development and maintenance of Internet protocols has a German boss. This was announced by the IETF nomination committee (NomCom) on the evening of 15. January 2021.

Eggert is in Main job as Technical Director at the US storage specialist NetApp and works from Finland. Like his predecessors Jari Arkko (Ericsson) and Alissa Cooper (Cisco), Eggert is likely to campaign for reforms in the working methods and structures of the time-honored IETF.

Lars Eggert becomes the new chairman of the Internet Engineering Task Force. The network specialist recently advanced the specification of the QUIC transport protocol.

The computer scientist, who has a doctorate from the University of Southern California, has been active in the IETF for around two decades, and has been on the cutting edge of networking. He headed the Transport Area, i.e. the area that takes care of the further development of the Transmission Control Protocol (TCP). He is currently the chairman of the working group for the TCP successor QUIC.

From 2011 to 2017 He was chairman of the Internet Research Task Force (IRTF), the research sister of the IETF, and tried to get more young scientists into bring the standardization organization. Among other things, the annual award of an IRTF prize for applied network research helped.

Researcher type instead of veteran He also bridges the gap between application and research in his main job at NetApp: One of his tasks is to raise funds for NetApp. One of his last coups was a program to develop “Federated Private Cloud Structures” (SSICLOPS) as part of the Horizon program 2020.

Active for the German subsidiary of NetApp for many years, he 2018 moved back to Finland, not least because of the better childcare as he once revealed. The competition for the chairmanship of the IETF was fierce. The election of Eggert by the 17 – headed NomCom underpins the generation change. In addition to Eggert, several candidates with a long history in the IETF applied, such as the former IETF chairman and former Cisco engineer Fred Baker.

Europe instead of Asia The standardizers can expect Eggert to push ahead with reforms to newer ways of working, such as collaboration via GitHub instead of the classic IETF way of working via mailing list. This will especially please the younger developers, with whom Eggert currently has a lot to do as head of the working group for the standardization of the QUIC transport protocol. The average age in the QUIC Working Group is 10 or even 15 Years below the general IETF average age, said Eggert recently in an interview with heise online.

The NomCom election result, however, is reflective also the efforts of the IETF to avoid a dispute over the “New IP”. Behind New IP are the Chinese network equipment supplier Huawei and its research subsidiary Futurewei, who want to counter the weaknesses of the current Internet architecture with their own concepts. Huawei had sent several candidates into the race for the IETF chairmanship. In view of the increasing calls for more diversity, including at the IETF, an IETF chairman of an Asian company would actually have been overdue. This would have brought the originally US-influenced organization, however, the hiccups about New IP and sanctions policy. Eggert’s election as IETF chairmanship seems to promise calmer waters. Previously, Harald Alvestrand and Jari Arkko were two Europeans who held this office.

Eggert was quite clearly against New IP and clearly distanced itself from proposals in various working groups to curtail encryption in favor of better management and monitoring. However, there was bad press for his employer when Bloomberg 17 reported that NetApp software came to Syria via an Italian company and was used there by the Syrian regime to monitor government opponents.

Handover in March Until the handover of the current chairman, Cisco engineer Alissa Cooper, in March, Eggert has to give up his other duties in the IETF. He said it would be really difficult to say goodbye to the QUIC Working Group, which is working under high pressure and with many extra meetings. Anyway, version 1 of the new transport protocol will be ready by then.

(dz)

Parler resurfaces on Sunday with an update message, but nothing else

Social media platform Parler was all but wiped off the internet last week, but on Sunday, showed some signs of life. A message from Parler CEO John Matze, first noted by CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan- is now appearing at the site’s URL, with an image showing a “technical difficulties” banner, and a message.

“Now seems like the right time to remind you all — both lovers and haters — why we started this platform. We believe privacy is paramount and free speech essential, especially on social media,” the message reads, pledging to “welcome all of you back soon.”

Amazon dropped Parler from its hosting platform earlier this month, saying in a letter it “cannot provide services to a customer that is unable to effectively identify and remove content that encourages or incites violence against others.” Parler was identified as a site where people who participated in the deadly January 6th assault on the Capitol had planned the attack.

The site is now hosted by Epik, as CNN notes, a hosting company that also supports far-right sites such as Gab and 8chan. Amazon’s suspension followed Apple and Google removing Parler’s app from their respective app stores. Matze said even Parler’s lawyers had cut ties.

Parler sued Amazon for cutting off its hosting, and in a response, Amazon detailed some of the graphic, violent threats posted to the site that led to its removal, including posts that called for shooting police officers, killing Black and Jewish people, and assassinations.

Parler launched in 2018, and its user numbers soared after Election Day in the US, as other social platforms tightened their moderation policies. Parler’s its less-strict moderation policies were a draw for many new users.

Parler may have a tough road back to its former state, however, after researchers archived 99 percent of its posts, scraping videos and other data, some with GPS info. That archive was used to create an interactive map of the attack on the Capitol.

Facebook is blocking events near the White House through Inauguration Day

Facebook won’t let people create events that take place “in close proximity” to the White House, the US Capitol building, or any state capitol buildings through Inauguration Day, the company announced on Friday. The move builds upon Facebook’s previously announced Inauguration Day preparations aiming to prevent the platform from being used to organize a violent event like the January 6th attack on the US Capitol.

Facebook is also doing a “secondary review” of all inauguration-related events and will remove those that violate the platform’s rules. The company is also continuing a policy that blocks pages and accounts based outside the US from creating events located in the US. That policy was first put in place for the US presidential election.

The company has come under scrutiny for allowing posts promoting and organizing the January 6th riots to spread across Facebook and Instagram, and for ads promoting military equipment that ran alongside content that contained election misinformation and calls for violence, according to BuzzFeed News. Although Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg said she believes the riots were “were largely organized on platforms that don’t have our abilities to stop hate,” the company is still stepping up enforcement of its policies and working to remove potentially dangerous content ahead of Inauguration Day.

Accounts that have repeatedly violated Facebook’s policies could be restricted. Those restrictions may include being blocked from creating live videos, events, groups, or pages, according to the company.

Facebook isn’t the only platform trying to prevent Inauguration Day gatherings. Airbnb is blocking and canceling all DC metro area reservations during inauguration week and is banning people who were involved in the January 6th riots.

In the days since that attack, many platforms have taken actions to try and prevent people from organizing another one. Facebook, for example, is now blocking the phrase “stop the steal.” Apple and Google have banned conservative-friendly social app Parler from their app stores, and Amazon has terminated Parler’s hosting, effectively kicking it off the internet.

Corona pandemic: tightening of lockdowns are looming

In view of the continued high number of infections and great concern about the coronavirus mutations that have emerged, the discussion about tightening the lockdown in the near future has really picked up speed. The federal and state governments are therefore bringing their deliberations forward to next week.

Next Tuesday to 14. 00 a conference of Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) and the Prime Minister of the federal states is planned, as government spokesman Steffen Seibert said on Friday. Originally, the next federal-state switch to measures against the corona pandemic was for the 25. January.

Parliamentary deliberations The Greens group has requested a special meeting of the Health and Economic Committee for next week. “In view of the dramatic situation, the Bundestag cannot wait until the next regular week of session,” said parliamentary group leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt the Spiegel . “As long as the number of infections does not go down, the lockdown measures cannot be ended, and further measures will be necessary, especially in the world of work,” emphasized the Green politician. “We should ask ourselves whether, in the end, a complete lockdown of two to three weeks is better than an endless hanging game,” said Thorsten Frei, deputy chairman of the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag.

Merkel did that Consultation needs on Thursday evening in meetings to prepare for the election party convention of the CDU according to information from dpa from several participants. The CDU party congress will take place on Friday and Saturday and should finally elect a new CDU chairman; Choices are Armin Laschet, Norbert Röttgen and Friedrich Merz.

There is currently no scope for openings, Merkel emphasized. Saxony’s Prime Minister Michael Kretschmer (CDU) said on Thursday evening in the ZDF broadcast Maybrit Illner : “Completely shut down kindergartens, close schools, really entry bans in the nursing homes if there is no negative rapid test – we need to discuss things like that. ”

Mutation spreads The The variant of the coronavirus that has emerged in the UK is spreading much faster than the original form, scientists are very worried. Everyone believes that the virus mutation is very aggressive and that its spread must be slowed down. Act now. Merkel was quoted as saying that one was in a race against time and could not go until 25. Wait January.

Saxony’s head of government said something very similar on ZDF. The number of infections has not decreased as a result of the current lockdown “as we wanted it and as we need it”. At this point, Kretschmer also referred to the possibly more contagious virus mutations that could further increase the number of infections.

Problem with public transport? In Kretschmer’s view, it is also important to take a look at local public transport. “The public transport, not so many people are allowed to ride. From my point of view, that is now the order of the day.” According to several participants, Merkel rejected a report in the “Bild” newspaper on Thursday evening at the CDU deliberations, according to which the Chancellery was thinking about the suspension of local and long-distance public transport.

Also The President of the Robert Koch Institute (RKI), Lothar Wieler, once again made it clear that, in his opinion, the measures taken to date in the fight against the coronavirus are insufficient. In the ARD “Tagesthemen” he also appealed to implement the current measures more consistently.

“We need more test sites that can detect the mutation,” demanded Bavaria’s Prime Minister Markus Söder (CSU) in the meantime the newspapers of the Funke media group. “In addition, FFP2 masks and a consistent implementation of the current lockdown help,” emphasized Söder, whose government has introduced an FFP2 mask requirement for Bavaria in local public transport and retail from Monday. Söder did not want to predict whether a hard lockdown would be necessary by Easter. But: “I also stay on the team, be careful.”

Race The SPD health expert Karl Lauterbach spoke at “maybrit illner” of a race to get the current wave under control quickly enough before the new virus mutations spread more widely. If that doesn’t work, “we won’t get out of lockdown anytime soon”. This will not succeed without tightening. Lauterbach explained that the average age in the large intensive care units is currently 60 years. Among them are many younger people, with obesity becoming an increasingly strong risk factor for the most severe courses.

The age in the intensive care units has decreased because there are many older people Die meanwhile in the nursing homes, said Lauterbach. “If, as in the first wave, we were to bring all the people from the care facilities to the intensive care units, then the intensive care unit would have long been overrun,” he said. Even with the best intensive care in the modern intensive care units, the sick nursing home residents died there. Accepting her there is no longer attempted today. Rather, one is now fighting over the large group of baby boomers with risk factors. “And we won’t last long.” Those are very difficult cases.

Intensive care units at the border The President of the German Interdisciplinary Association for intensive care and emergency medicine (Divi), Gernot Marx, brought a possible target mark of less than 1000 Covid in the newspapers of the Funke media group – 19 – Intensive care patients as a condition for easing into play. “Spoken in traffic light colors: In 11 from 16 federal states, the traffic light is red, there is less than 15 Percent free intensive care beds, “said Marx. Any easing is unlikely to come until the situation has eased significantly. “The number of intensive care Covid – 16 – patients must be well below 1000 Patients are lying. ” Currently, almost 5200 Covid – 19 – Patients treated in intensive care all over Germany.

In Germany, over two million people have been infected with the virus since the outbreak of the corona pandemic. The health authorities reported to the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) 22. 368 new corona infections within 24 hours , as the RKI announced on Friday morning. This increased the number of cases that have become known since the beginning of the pandemic to 2. 000 .958 (Was standing: 15. 01., 00. 00 Clock). It should be noted that the actual total number is likely to be significantly higher, since many infections are not recognized. In addition, 1113 new deaths were reported within 24 hours recorded. The previous high of 1244 new deaths was reached on Thursday.

(jk)