Bloomberg Quint: Google, Facebook Would Face FTC Over Policies in Democratic Bill. “A top Democratic lawmaker wants to empower the U.S. Federal Trade Commission to take action against Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc., among other technology platforms, if they fail to remove content that violates their terms of service and community standards.”
content removal
Techdirt: Just Like Every Other Platform, Parler Will Take Down Content And Face Impossible Content Moderation Choices
Techdirt: Just Like Every Other Platform, Parler Will Take Down Content And Face Impossible Content Moderation Choices . “Like Gab before it, the hot new Twitter-wannabe service for assholes and trolls kicked off of Twitter is Parler. The President and a bunch of his supporters have hyped it up, and the latest is that Senator Ted Cruz (and Rep. Devin Nunes) have recently joined it, and like others before them they have hyped up the misleading claim that Parler supports free speech unlike Twitter…. But, I did want to take a closer look at the claims that Parler supports free speech, because it does so in basically the same way every other platform — including the way Twitter, Youtube and Facebook do: by saying that they can remove your content for any reason they want.”
Variety: Facebook Adds Tool to Bulk-Delete Old Posts, Hide Content From Other Users
Variety: Facebook Adds Tool to Bulk-Delete Old Posts, Hide Content From Other Users. “Facebook is making it easier for users to wipe out embarrassing or otherwise personally painful posts. The social-media giant announced Manage Activity, a new feature to make it easier for users to delete or hide many posts at once.”
Wired: How to Clean Up Your Old Social Media Posts
Wired: How to Clean Up Your Old Social Media Posts. “If your social media life spans more than a few years then you might not want friends, family, or prospective employers looking back on the sort of person that you used to be. Here we’ll show you how you can scrub your timelines on the three biggest social platforms, using both built-in tools and third-party add-ons.”
Engadget: Facebook suspended hundreds of anti-racist skinheads and musicians
Engadget: Facebook suspended hundreds of anti-racist skinheads and musicians. “Facebook’s determination to crack down on hate speech swept up some innocent people. OneZero has learned that Facebook temporarily suspended ‘hundreds’ of anti-racist activists from SHARP (Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice), as well as the reggae and ska communities, for allegedly violating site standards. It even included ska legend Neville Staple of The Specials. “
Reuters: Facebook takes down white nationalist and fake antifa accounts
Reuters: Facebook takes down white nationalist and fake antifa accounts. “Facebook Inc (FB.O) said Tuesday it has suspended accounts associated with white nationalist groups after some advocated bringing weapons to the current wave of anti-racist protests. Company officials also said they removed accounts falsely claiming allegiance to antifa in order to bring discredit to the anti-fascist movement.”
BBC: Facebook removes ‘inauthentic’ George Floyd groups
BBC: Facebook removes ‘inauthentic’ George Floyd groups. “BBC News had highlighted some suspicious groups had switched their focus to call for justice for the black man killed in police custody. Some, run by accounts seemingly based in Vietnam or Bangladesh, had posted misleading images. And others had previously focused on coronavirus, 5G conspiracies and support for US President Donald Trump. A Facebook spokesman said it had ‘removed the vast majority of them, for violating our policies’.”
TorrentFreak: Google Removes Official Kodi Download Page After “Bogus” Copyright Complaint (Updated)
TorrentFreak: Google Removes Official Kodi Download Page After “Bogus” Copyright Complaint (Updated). “Google has removed the official Kodi download page from its search results, following a complaint from a copyright holder. The team behind the perfectly legal open-source software is disappointed that they’re being inaccurately lumped together with pirate services. The same takedown notice also targeted the VLC media player, but those requests were rejected.” Google did restore the page. Eventually.
Reuters: Social media giants warn of AI moderation errors as coronavirus empties offices
Reuters: Social media giants warn of AI moderation errors as coronavirus empties offices. “Alphabet Inc’s YouTube, Facebook Inc (FB.O) and Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) warned on Monday that more videos and other content could be erroneously removed for policy violations, as the companies empty offices and rely on automated takedown software during the coronavirus pandemic.”
Music Ally: BPI has now asked Google to remove more than 500m search links
Music Ally: BPI has now asked Google to remove more than 500m search links. “British music industry body the BPI has set a new milestone, but it’s announcing it in frustration rather than celebration. The body says it has just submitted its 500 millionth URL to Google, asking for it to be delisted from the company’s search engine on the grounds of copyright infringement. The BPI also says it has sent 398m removal notices to Microsoft for the Bing and Yahoo search engines, meaning it’s on course to reach 1bn total link submissions across those search engines this year.” BPI stands for British Phonographic Industry.
TorrentFreak: Reddit’s Copyright Infringement Removals Increased by 500% Last Year
TorrentFreak: Reddit’s Copyright Infringement Removals Increased by 500% Last Year. “Reddit has published new data which shows that 124,247 pieces of content were removed following copyright takedown notices last year. This is a fivefold increase compared to the year before. For the first time, the site also reported details on its repeat infringer policy which resulted in 283 users and 137 subreddits being banned.”
Washington Post: Father of slain journalist Alison Parker takes on YouTube over alleged refusal to remove graphic videos
Washington Post: Father of slain journalist Alison Parker takes on YouTube over alleged refusal to remove graphic videos. “It has been more than four years since journalist Alison Parker, doing a live television interview in southern Virginia, was killed when a former colleague walked up and shot her and videographer Adam Ward. Despite repeated requests from her father and others, videos of the slaying remain on YouTube, as do countless other graphic videos that show people dying or that promote various outlandish hoaxes.”
TorrentFreak: Facebook Sued Over Failure to Respond to DMCA Takedown Notices
TorrentFreak: Facebook Sued Over Failure to Respond to DMCA Takedown Notices. “Seattle-based photographer Christopher Boffoli is suing Facebook for copyright infringement. According to the complaint, the social media platform failed to remove a series of links to copyrighted photos. The takedown notices in question were sent around the same time a TorrentFreak-linked Boffoli-meme was taken down by Facebook.”
New York Times: Germany to Require Social Media Sites to Report Hate Speech
New York Times: Germany to Require Social Media Sites to Report Hate Speech. “According to the bill passed by ministers Wednesday, internet companies will have to flag far-right propaganda, graphic portrayals of violence, murder or rape threats, posts indicating that someone is preparing a terrorist attack or distributing child sexual abuse images.”
BBC News: New Twitter filter deletes naked pictures from messages
BBC News: New Twitter filter deletes naked pictures from messages. “A new social media filter has been launched to prevent users from receiving unsolicited naked pictures. On Friday the plugin – called Safe DM – which blocks and deletes pictures of penises sent via direct message became available to Twitter users.” It’s an add-on to the Twitter service, not a browser plugin. BuzzFeed news tested the filter. I did not want to use that as the main article in this case because some of the pictures were er well um. But if you want to see how the tests went, you can read the article here.
