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The EU Asks Facebook, Google, and Twitter to Do More to Combat Fake News

Leave a Comment / Facebook, Google, Microsoft, News, Tech News, TikTok, twitter / By

The coronavirus pandemic has been a rather unfortunate event that has shaken the world vigorously. However, one of the gravest aftermaths of it has been the large-scale sharing of fake news. Around the world, governments are doing all they can to hold tech giants more accountable for their actions. As a result of combined efforts, tech giants, such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter had agreed to accept a self-regulatory code in a bid to combat fake news two years ago. However, the European Commission has now urged these companies to do more to prevent the spread of disinformation. Here’s a look at what the EU is asking of these companies, and how they have reacted in the past.

Proactive Approach

The COVID-19 situation has made governments more active with regards to stopping the spread of misinformation. As a result, social media is now being asked to take a more proactive approach when it comes to combating fake news. The tech giants mentioned above, along with companies like Mozilla and advertising bodies have been asked to do more. All these companies had signed a more lenient deal in 2018 that aimed to prevent more heavy-handed regulations against hate speech. Later on, TikTok and Microsoft also joined these companies in promising to stop the spread of fake news. 

Shortcomings in the Code

However, following an assessment last year, experts concluded that the Code contained several shortcomings. As per a study done by Reuters, the Code allowed for its incomplete and inconsistent application. Furthermore, the report stated that there was a lack of uniform definitions, which allowed for different platforms to interpret the laws differently. Also, there were a lot of gaps in the commitments stated in the Code. The Code also featured limitations that were intrinsic to the very nature of the self-regulatory Code. Vera Jourova, who serves as the Vice President of the European Commission, therefore, called for greater transparency.

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Image Source: digitalinformationworld.com

Flexibility in the Digital Rule Book

Jourova also stated that the world is now witnessing new threats, making new measures extremely essential. Furthermore, Jourova said that these social media platforms need to be held accountable and that they should become more transparent. They also need to provide better access to their data to make the internet a safer place. As a result, the Commission is working on an Action Plan which will help the E.U. become more resilient towards digital threats. The E.U. Commission will soon propose a Digital Services Act by the end of 2020 to increase the responsibilities and liabilities of such platforms.

Requirement for Better Laws

The new Act aims to bring more rules that will restrict the freedom of platforms, products, and services. As a result, the move has set ablaze a fear within the tech industry as they will now face more heavy-handed opposition from governments. A joint statement regarding the inefficiencies of the older plan and the need for a new one came out on Tuesday. The announcement was made by Vera Jourova, who is the EU Commissioner, Security Chief Julian King, and Mariya Gabriel, who serves as the Digital Commissioner. The statement also noted that the old laws allowed for the large-scale spread of propaganda and disinformation which needs to be stopped. As a result, the EU Commission said that the tech giants need to work together and cooperate with governmental and independent bodies.

Trouble Brewing

In recent years, both Facebook and Twitter, with the former in particular have come under scrutiny in the US and Europe. One of the main talking points in such debates has been the Russian influence on the 2016 American election and the Brexit vote that occurred in the UK. The fears of such an influence led to the EU, asking for a better framework to moderate and regulate the spread of information by such platforms. The EU also stepped in requesting American tech companies to provide monthly reports with data on how they are fighting fake news regarding COVID-19 in June. With the US Presidential Election set to take place next year, the pressure is mounting to build such a framework as soon as possible. The rise in the number of manipulated videos and audios by using Deep-Fake technology has also become a popular talking point. Facebook’s refusal to fact-check posts have also drawn fire from lawmakers in the US, and employees within the company. Hence, it will be interesting to see how the companies handle this new law, and whether it will be successful in changing the way social

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Facebook Takes the Battle to the Government by Planning to Block Australian Publishers from Sharing Articles

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Facebook in a new statement has announced that it will block publishers and users from Australia from sharing news pieces and articles. However, this move will serve as a significant pushback against a newly proposed law that will force Facebook to pay media companies for their articles and content. Furthermore, this new announcement will also escalate tensions between the tech giant and the Australian government. Both parties have been caught in a bitter antitrust battle, with the government holding Google and Facebook responsible for paying publishers for the content they provide these platforms. Here’s a look at how the battle came to heads and what this move could mean to users and publishers.

New Law In-Play

The Australian government is yet to approve and ass the new legislation. However, an arbitration panel tasked with working out the by-laws and clauses has proposed that tech companies must pay their content publishers if the two sides cannot agree. Facebook hit back through a blog post yesterday, claiming that such a proposal was hugely unfair. The social media giant also stated that such a law would allow content creators and publishers to charge any amount they wanted. Furthermore, the company said that if the law did come through, it would be forced to prevent Australians from sharing any media on Facebook and Instagram. 

Facebook Takes A Stand

Facebook’s VP of Global News, Campbell Brown, said that this decision was hard to take for the company. However, he reiterated that it was the only way to protect Facebook against a move that would hurt them and Australia’s media outlets. She went ahead to state that the social media giant was still working on a full-proof method to block Australian media from sharing articles. Following this announcement, Josh Frydenberg, who serves as Australia’s Treasurer, said that these were nothing but heavy-handed threats.

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Instead, he stated that such a law would help make the media landscape more sustainable as digital platforms would have to pay for the content they put out. Rod Sims, who serves as Australia’s competition regulator, also said that such threats were misconceived and ill-timed. He went on to say that the newly proposed law would go a long way in ensuring that the media remains fair and transparent.

Google Follows Suit

Since the Australian legislation will also affect the Alphabet’s Google, the tech giant has also been vocal about its displeasure regarding such a law. They too raised alarms and said that such a measure would force them to put out much less efficient versions of Google Search and YouTube. As a result, such a move, Google Australia and New Zealand MD, Mel Silva, said would critically damage the use of free internet services, like Google in Australia. 

Fighting for Transparency

The Aussie government claims it is only trying to make things more fair and transparent for its media bodies. Furthermore, it states that such a law would help level the playing field and give local media a chance against large tech companies. For instance, the local media is struggling as a result of the free sharing of news by such tech giants with News Corp, a media agency owned by Rupert Murdoch planning to cut jobs in Australia.

Murdoch’s decision will result in the closing down of over 100 regional and local newspapers in Australia, putting these media persons at risk. Murdoch has long asked Facebook and Google to pay for the articles, news pieces and content that appear on their platforms. Hence, it was obvious that New Corp would laud the government’s efforts to make this a reality. Michael Miller, who serves as the executive chairman of News Corp, stated that such a move would put an end to the tech giant’s free-riding on the content created by others. Since such companies derive a lot of benefit from such content, it is only fair that they pay the people making such content out of their own pockets.

Impact and After-Effect

However, if Facebook does follow through with its plans as per the announcement, publishers would no longer have access to a broad audience. Facebook claims that in just the first five months of this year, it sent over 2.3 billion clicks to news websites based in Australia from its News Feed. As a result, blocking such news from their feed could result in a massive loss of audience for news channels, while also limiting the appeal the platform enjoys in Australia. Australia’s new rules come as a part of a global push to make tech giants more accountable and regulated.

France came out with a statement asking Google to pay media companies for the articles it shares in April. Two months later, Google said it would start paying for certain news services in Brazil and Germany. Facebook came out with its separate News Feed last October and pays certain publishers for stories. The tech giant is also in plans to extend this News tab on a global basis but will block the sharing of news if governments try to intervene in its efforts. It will be interesting to see whether the social media giant is capable of halting this global push for more regulation and whether that would be a wise choice for the consumers.

Facebook Profile

Facebook Private Profile Viewer Software

Leave a Comment / Facebook, Tech tips / By

Everyone has these days Facebook private profile and people always seem busy on the messenger to update their profile like they are making money out of it. Yeah, it sounds funny, but it really seems quite confusing that what makes users spend all day long on the Facebook instant messaging app.

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On the other hand, the young generation that has opened their eyes in the presence of modern technology they are the ones who are obsessed with the use of Facebook and their exciting features for the sake of communication with the friend’s online, family members and with the people they don’t know in their real –life.

Young kids and teens make photos and cover photos and even share their photos in terms of selfies to get appreciation from their online Facebook community. They also share videos on the social messaging app and further do many other activates in the name of socializing that really make a concern to the parents to the fullest.

Also Read: Mark Zuckerberg: The Founder & CEO of World’s Biggest Social Network

Facebook could be dangerous for teens

Using Facebook is not the bad thing at all, but when it comes to using the messenger for negative purposes really put teens into real trouble. The use of state of the art tools of the social messaging app Facebook would be vulnerable for the safety of the teens.

Young kids and teens mostly share their compromised videos and photos on the Facebook profile and when this shared multimedia went viral, then a number of online monsters try to approach them online.

Young kids and teens send and receive text messages, chat conversations, audio and video calls, shared media as photos and videos, and Facebook Voice messages.

Also Read: Randall L. Stephenson – A Dazzling Star In The World Of Telecommunication

 Moreover, cyber predators such as stalkers, and sexual predators pretend as they want to be their lovers or friends and then ask them for real-life meetings. So, young kids and teens often rapped online and reportedly been raped and molested.

However, cyberbullying factor is one of the most threatening and teens number of times bullied online and got depression and anxiety. Furthermore, young teens are also getting involved willingly into sexting, blind dates, and become obsessed with the social media app.

That’s why parents have to realize what they should do to monitor the Facebook profile to the fullest to get to know what kids and teens are doing on the messenger and to whom they are having conversations and what sort of social media app privacy options they have used. So, they can use Facebook private profile viewer in terms of Facebook spy app. Therefore, Parents have to get services of a cell phone monitoring apps to spy on the Facebook instant messaging app.

Installation of app on smartphones

You just need to subscribe for the phone spy software and you will receive an email that gives you the credentials. Then you just need to get physical access to the target device and then install the cell phone spy app and when you have done it successfully then activate it on the target device.

Moreover, you just need to use the credentials and get access to the online control panel of the mobile phone spy app and then visit the Facebook spy app features that will give you complete access to monitoring tools to view the complete profile and activities of teens on Facebook with a complete time stamp.

IM’s social media

You can monitor and view Facebook instant messenger logs such as text messages, chat conversations, audio, and video conversations, shared media files such as photos and videos, and last but not least Facebook Voice calls.

Live Facebook screen recording

You can do the live screen recording of the target cell phone screen when the messenger is being used by the target person and you can make short videos that you can view by getting access to the online control panel and get to know the details.

Also Read: Eric S. Yuan : CEO & Founder of Zoom Video Communications, ‘A Service That Connects People’

Keylogger

You can view Keystrokes applied to the target device such as password keystrokes, messenger keystrokes, messages keystrokes and others. Once you have got it you can get access to the target Facebook account on the target phone and can view the information on the Facebook profile.

Conclusion:

The Facebook private profile can be viewed via android spy software and you can use it as a Facebook private profile viewer, and get to know the activities.

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Facebook to Acquire GIF-giant Giphy in A Major Tech Buy-Out

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There have not been major acquisitions in the tech space in recent times due to the impact of the COVID-19. However, that seems to be changing, with a significant announcement coming from Facebook yesterday. Facebook has decided to acquire the GIF-giant Giphy in a bid to control the GIF industry. Here’s a look at what the acquisition will mean for Facebook and its competitors.

Facebook Buys Giphy

Facebook’s acquisition of Giphy can change the way we send and receive GIFs forever. Studies have shown that over 700 million people use Giphy to send and receive short video content daily. Most of this happens over popular social media apps such as Twitter, TikTok, WhatsApp, and iMessage. All these applications make use of Giphy’s API to send others GIFs and other such content. An issue will arise because of these companies will not want to integrate with a Facebook platform. Since Facebook has had notorious privacy issues, they would prefer not to utilise Facebook-owned platforms for their content. Also, Facebook’s reliability has taken a big hit due to frequent bugs, crashes, and upgrade issues. 

Moving Forward

However, Facebook has made it clear that developers will be able to utilise Giphy even after the acquisition. Instagram VP for product, Vishal Shah remarked that users will still be able to use Giphy to send and receive content. Further, Giphy’s in-house team will also continue to create and upload new GIFs. Furthermore, the GIFs do not contain any cookies or tracking mechanisms, meaning people do not have to worry about privacy. Giphy has also confirmed that the app can view only search terms, and not any of the data stored on your phone. However, many experts worry that after the acquisition, Facebook can change how the company works. Therefore, a lot of applications that now use Giphy could drop the service after the big buy-out. 

Major Applications Which Use Giphy

Here’s a look at some of the world’s most popular apps that make use of Giphy. 

iMessage: The #images application, which is pre-built into the iOS, allows users to send GIFs via the iMessage. However, the integration with Facebook could lead to some tension between Apple and the social media giant. Apple has strong privacy norms, which they will not like to dilute, which can lead to them stopping their collaboration with the GIF company. 

MailChimp: MailChimp, which is one of the world’s most used email marketing, and mailing list software, allows users to add GIFs into emails. Reports state that the company will continue offering this service, even after the buy-out. This does not come as a surprise as the company already had some Facebook integration built into their software.

Signal: Signal sources a lot of their GIFs from Giphy, and also allows users to add GIFs to their messages. Since it is a privacy-focused messaging application that provides end-to-end encryption, we are unsure whether they will continue this service post-acquisition. Even if they do, due to their high-security measures, Facebook might not be able to access any data. 

Slack: Slack also allowed users to add GIFs into their messages and chats while using the messaging app. Their VP, Brian Elliot, released a statement that Giphy had information only about GIF searches, and hence, privacy would not become a pressing concern. 

Snapchat: Snapchat added a Giphy integration in 2018, and has not yet decided whether it will continue to allow the union to function. 

Telegram: Telegram, coupled with Giphy to allow users to add GIFs to their messages. The application also confirmed that Giphy receives no information regarding the users who utilise Telegram. Therefore, they were not concerned with privacy issues. However, they are in plans to transition away from their dependence on Giphy. 

TikTok and Tinder: TikTok allows you to send GIFs and stickers through Giphy. However, they have not released any comment regarding the future of this partnership after the acquisition. Tinder, too, has refused to comment on the issue. However, since both these apps allow users to log in using their Facebook account, in most likelihood, the union will continue. 

Twitter: Twitter makes use of both Tenor and Giphy to source their GIFs. Since Twitter and Facebook have a running feud, it is highly likely that the company will now depend entirely on Tenor for their GIFs. 

The deal is reportedly said to cost somewhere around $400 million, and once in place can have a lot of implications to the way we send and receive GIFs. We will have, however, have to wait and see how the deal plays through, and how these companies react to the acquisition. 

Facebook

Facebook to Gather New Campaign “More Together” in India from Now On

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As technology progressed, it helped to make the world a much smaller place. While in the past, people had to rely on letters to communicate with people living far away, as we moved ahead, faster, more efficient means developed. The world is moving towards a digital era, wherein we all have our digital personas on the world wide web. Social media has evolved to become an integral part of our lives, and most of us have accounts on multiple platforms. As the degree of internet penetration continues to rise, more and more people will join social media networks such as Instagram and Facebook. In fact, the competition amongst social media networking sites is so high that several of them have had to shut down due to a lack of an active user base. So how do social media sites ensure that they stay relevant and attract new users? Here’s a look at how Facebook is trying to stay on top of the game through an innovative marketing campaign.

What’s More Together About?

Social media giant, Facebook announced on Monday that it was going to launch a new campaign, More Together, in a bid to attract more new users in India. The initiative will focus on the app and will work towards making the company more relatable and human. One aspect of this program is to highlight stories that showcase the power of the network to bridge gaps and form relationships. This campaign will, therefore, help people realize how the platform has been integral in building connections and sustaining friendships all over the world. This campaign is the first of its kind in India and will go a long way in helping people become even more aware of Facebook’s power to bring people together.

Who’s Behind This Campaign?

The idea for such a campaign came from the Dentsu Aegis Network, which is a creative agency working in India. The plan was conceptualized by the head of this agency, Taproot Dentsu. The plan will see the release of advertisements in over eight Indian languages which will be aired all over the country in the weeks to come. The campaign aims to be a 360-degree strategy that will span across various mediums, such as radio, cinema, and social media.

Why Opt for Such a Campaign?

The main idea behind such a campaign was that in recent years Facebook had stopped telling stories about itself. Also, most of the time when such a story was put out, it was orchestrated by other groups and not by Facebook itself, which led to a divide in the narrative. Facebook India MD, Ajit Mohan believes that a campaign that comes from the social media giant itself will help in reaching out to even more people, as the narrative is extremely informal and personal.

There is a need to change the people’s perspective on Facebook, and such a campaign will help Facebook control its own narrative, as its own app will be at the epicenter of the campaign. Facebook also plans on spending even more on marketing and promotions within the country, and this campaign is just the start of many more things to come in the future.

Other Creative Members

The first TV commercial under this new campaign will release on Saturday and has been directed by none other than, Chak De India! fame Shimit Amin. Pallavi Chakravarti from Dentsu Aegis was given the responsibility to head the copywriting team behind the campaign and has incorporated several real stories from around the country. These stories capture the essence of what Facebook is and showcases it in a very raw light, inspired by real people and their stories.

Complementary advertisements have been led by Bharat Sikka and will feature YourFood Lab expert Sanjyot Kheer, Curly Tales fame Kamiya Jani and Madhuras recipe protégé Madhura Bachal. Furthermore, the ads will also feature Paula McGlynn, Sarang Sathaye, Chhavi Mittal, Varun Pruthi and Maithili Thakur.

All these people have used Facebook to build connections and improve their lives, and hence, will serve as ambassadors for the social media platform. This campaign comes after the brand’s famous decision to change its logo in November of last year and seems to be a continuation of that marketing strategy. Furthermore, the company has also appointed Avinash Pant as the MD for the Indian region.

Facebook Portal TV

Portal TV: New Video Chat Devices from Facebook for Your Living Room

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Despite the backlashes for the user’s privacy invasion, Facebook has been always the leader in the field of social media. And, now the company wants to move ahead with its home devices. Last year, the company launched its own video chat device, Portal Plus, which seemed to be vain when people can use their smartphones for video chats. But Facebook had got its plans for the new hardware range. That is why, now the company has unveiled three more home devices in the similar range.

As a part of its connected devices to TV strategy, Facebook has just launched a new video chat and streaming device called Portal TV. The device is specially built for the users to make video calls over Facebook Messenger and Whatsapp, and for that, the company has incorporated a wide-angle video camera and a microphone to the device. The camera is capable of zooming and following the people around the room for the video calls.

Users can log in to their Facebook accounts on the Portal TV by plugging in the Portal device to the HDMI port of the TV, and they are ready to make video calls. The users need to say “Hey Portal” to the device and instruct it to call the particular person (from their friend list). The same procedure goes for Whatsapp. A picture-in-picture feature included in the Portal device lets the users watch Facebook Watch altogether with video calls to their friends, both in one screen.

Facebook Portal TV
Image Source: pocket-lint.com

The company is careful with its users’ privacy this time at least, as Facebook has included the options to turn off the camera and the microphone, simply by tapping on it or by sliding the cover to the camera, whenever they want. Also, like for the Whatsapp chat smartphone app, the chats, video and text, are encrypted, these are encrypted end to end for the Portal TV, too. But again, there is something unusual that the company has included in the device, and that is, human auditors to listen to what the users are talking over the calls to improve the service. Yes, the device will be continuously recording human chattering, and the Facebook contractors will be reviewing the talks. But again, the users can opt-out of this feature anytime.

Other than that, the device also offers streaming various channels, including Amazon Prime, Facebook Watch, Showtime, etc. The users can also play augmented reality games on the TV while making video calls.

The company revealed that it will bring the devices in the market starting from November 5th, and the Portal TV will cost $149.

Along with the Portal TV, the company also announced two more devices, the Portal Mini video chat smart speaker and a redesigned version of its Portal speakers. The Portal Mini costs $129, and the speakers cost $179. These two devices will be available in the market from October 15. However, buying all three devices together will get you an off of $50.