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World

Facebook: ‘Governments Exploit Us’

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Facebook has acknowledged that they are exploited by governments in manipulating public opinion, and also said they would try to do something about reducing these types of “information operations.”

Governments use Facebook to amplify a view, sow distrust, and spread confusion, according to the company.

Recently, Facebook made an attempt to cut down this use of their platform by suspending 30,000 accounts in France before the French presidential election.

Facebook was a key tool in the campaign of current U.S. President Donald Trump as well, according to his campaign team.

Source: Facebook Newsroom

Female Muslim Clerics Issue Fatwa Against ‘Child Marriage’

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Indonesian female clerics issued a fatwa (nothing legal but a matter of religion) after holding a 3-day meeting.

They also want the government there to make marriage illegal for women under 18. Currently, 16 is the marriage age.

According to the UN, 1/4 of Indonesian women marry before they are 18.

The fatwa is unusual because most are issued by the highest Islamic authority, the Ulema Council, which is mostly men.

Brazil: Nationwide Strikes Crippling Nation

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Protest over President Michel Temer’s austerity measures are crippling public transport in several major cities, and many factories, businesses and schools are closed, including in major tourist areas.

Police have barricaded protesters from entering airports (some flights were delayed and cancelled earlier) and are trying to clear up roadways.

Brazil has not had a nationwide strike in over 20 years. The current protests are not yet at the ‘nationwide strike’ level, but threaten to get there, according to union leaders.

Temer assumed power after former President Dilma Rousseff was ousted. Temer was then vice president.

The cause of the protests: Brazil’s lower house passed a labor reform bill many see as undermining workers’ rights by eliminating payment for their commute from their contractors, reducing compensation for employer abuse, and allowing reduction of salaries and increasing hours.

Police Illegally Obtained Journalist’s Phone Records Under New Metadata Program

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The Australian Federal Police announced this week that they illegally obtained a journalist’s phone records under the Turnbull government’s new metadata retention plan.

The breach was accidental, according to the police, and happened as part of an investigation into a leak of police material.

The journalist was not notified about their data being accessed, due to the sensitive nature of the police work, AFP said.

“This was human error … . There was no ill will or malice or bad intent by the officers involved who breached the Act. But simply it was a mistake.”

AFP said their practices would now see “significant changes.”

NSA Changes Surveillance Policy

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Email and texts will no longer be collected just for mentioning a target of the agency, according to the NSA; only communications sent to and from a target will be collected

Tillerson Warns UN About North Korea

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The secretary of state warned the UN Security Council that failure to act now on North Korea may bring “catastrophic consequences.”

He called for “painful new sanctions” to pressure North Korea to give up it’s nuclear and missile programs.

North Korea tested another missile day of the meeting. Reportedly, the test likely failed.

Factum Arte Is Recreating Art for the Masses, as Well as Private Buyers

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A team of software designers, technicians, conservators, architects, artists, artisans, working together as Factum Arte, are recreating works of art to be used by the public. Some of their work is already used by museums. The group makes its money by also producing works in the private market.

The goal of their public efforts are to give more people the chance to understand works of art and to help preserve them.

Workers at Factum Arte are now planning to replace works of art destroyed by ISIS. Their facsimiles are made from originals removed by Europeans in earlier eras from Iraq.

Because the works are not originals, there is less concern about damaging them, so they can be placed in their original setting, giving visitors what may be a more authentic experience of them.

How close are the facsimiles to the originals? In terms of resolution, around 100 microns (1 point of information per 1/10th of a millimeter), and technology continues to improve.

Trump: Historic Travel Expenses

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The new president has so far racked up a travel bill of $20m.

The rate, accumulated over Trump’s first 100 days, if continued would cost $294 million after 4 years, or over half a billion after 8.

One of the top destinations for the president is his private Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, which he calls the “Winter White House.”

For comparison, Obama spent $97m in 8 years.

Snapchat: Where Are We?

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The app may be on every young person’s phone, but it’s losing money.

When it launched its IPO this year, it raised $3.4b.

But as of January, it’s lost $1.2b. Almost half of that loss was in 2016.

It was growing at 15m new daily users in the first 3 quarters of 2016, but the last quarter had just 5m new users.

Snapchat is trying to make money by employing industry experts, and they will be setting their sights on combating competitors who do basically the same thing as Snapchat — Instagram with Stories and WhatsApp with Status. They will also be trying to win away advertising investment from other platforms.

However, investment in video ads is growing steadily, adding about $5 per year since 2014. Growth expected to increase, and be worth $90m in 2020, up from today’s $75m.