ShareCast: FCA warns Google to stop accepting scam adverts . “UK regulator the Financial Conduct Authority has warned tech giant Google that it will take legal action if it continues to accept advertisements for online financial scams.”
UK Government: Boost for open justice as court judgments get new home. “The website will host thousands of court judgments, saving time and money for lawyers, judges, academics, journalists, students and members of the public who require them for vital case preparation or research purposes. Judicial Review rulings, European case law, commercial judgments and many more cases of legal significance from the High Court, Upper Tier Tribunal, and the Court of Appeal will be readily available to anyone from April 2022.”
Radio Times: BBC reveals new archive that allows access to 200,000 programmes – and early editions of Radio Times. “Formerly known as BBC Genome, the BBC’s Programme Index now makes the broadcaster’s archive more accessible than ever, with viewers able to browse over 10 million listings, 200,000 playable programmes and even early editions of Radio Times magazine.”
King’s College London: Five Objects connecting Shakespeare and the Royal Family. “Shakespeare in the Royal Collection is a three-year AHRC-funded research project exploring the relationship between Shakespeare and the royal family in the centuries since Shakespeare’s death. A team of researchers have created an online database containing all the Shakespeare-related items in the Royal Collection (including paintings, books, drawings, prints, letters, essays, decorative objects, furniture and photographs), which anyone can explore.”
Competition and Markets Authority (UK): CMA to scrutinise Apple and Google mobile ecosystems. “The CMA has launched a market study into Apple’s and Google’s mobile ecosystems over concerns they have market power which is harming users and other businesses.”
The Guardian: If the British understood taxes better, perhaps we would vote for them to be fairer. “TaxLab, an information service unveiled by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, is a wonder of elegant clarity, its impartial explainers revealing what everyone should know: and it’s guaranteed to surprise most people. Two years in construction, the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) and the Friends Provident Foundation funded it to create a better-informed electorate. A mouse-click shows that people in Britain pay less tax (in 2019 figures), at 33% of GDP, than the EU average of 39%, while in Denmark it’s 46%. Put in your pay and TaxLab shows exactly where you stand in the income pecking order: people wildly miscalculate, both rich and poor, placing themselves too near the middle. Young people are generous to older people, but if they understood the tax biases benefiting retired people they might be more […]
The Guardian: The push to archive the history of jungle and drum’n’bass. “Chingford Sainsbury’s may be an unlikely setting for an encounter that helped capture a key part of British cultural history, but MC Navigator’s weekly shopping trip to his local supermarket would prove crucial. Navigator, one of the leading figures in the jungle and drum’n’bass scene in the 1990s, bumped into Uncle 22 – another important player – who had been under the radar for years and was picking up some bits with his mum.”
Channel 4: NHS England digital database launch delayed by two months after patient outcry over consultation . “A new central NHS database using GP records in England won’t now come online until September, amid concerns about privacy. The digital system was meant to be launched next month, collating information on patient appointments, treatments and referrals, as well as other data held by local surgeries.”
The Independent: New website to help patients and NHS staff check hospital waiting times. “A group of patient activists has set up a new website using official NHS data to allow patients to check the waiting times for treatments at their local hospital. The new waiting times tool is thought to be the first automated and regularly updated website that shows hospital performance against key waiting time targets, by medical specialty such as cardiology or orthopaedics.”
BBC: Rescuers question what3words’ use in emergencies. “Mountain rescuers have questioned the accuracy of using a location app, citing dozens of examples where the wrong address was given to their teams. What3Words (W3W) divides the world into three-by-three metre squares, each with a three-word address. It is free and used by 85% of UK emergency services.”
Financial Times: England’s NHS plans to share patient records with third parties. I do not usually share Financial Times articles because of the paywall, but this article was not paywalled to me. “England’s NHS is preparing to scrape the medical histories of 55m patients, including sensitive information on mental and sexual health, criminal records and abuse, into a database it will share with third parties. The data collection project, which is the first of its kind, has caused an uproar among privacy campaigners, who say it is ‘legally problematic’, especially as patients only have a few weeks to opt out of the plan.”
Vice: The Website Amplifying the Search for Missing Black People. “Across the UK, Black people have been going missing in disproportionate numbers. Despite making up only 3.3 percent of the population of England and Wales, National Crime Agency statistics indicate that Black people made up 14 percent of missing persons cases in 2019 and 2020 – over four times their relative population. In London, 36 percent of missing persons in the city were Black, almost three times their city population of 13.3 percent. Dominic Norton, a self-taught software developer, is hoping to step up the search for missing Black people in the UK. “
Reuters: UK unveils law to fine social media firms which fail to remove online abuse. “Britain said on Wednesday a planned new law would see social media companies fined up to 10% of turnover or 18 million pounds ($25 million) if they failed to stamp out online abuses such as racist hate crimes, while senior managers could also face criminal action.”
New York Times: The U.K. Spy Agency MI5 Joined Instagram. It Wasn’t for the Likes.. “Take Instagram, a clearinghouse for vacation selfies, food pictures and airbrushed dispatches from your friends’ lives. Now add MI5, Britain’s domestic intelligence agency, known for its spying and secret-keeping, performed — in the fog of popular imagination, anyway — by handsome, tuxedoed men who drink martinis. A match made in influencer heaven?”
