UK government wants Ofcom to police social media
The UK government has long wanted to police the internet, and now it has expressed a desire for Ofcom to regulate social media.
The government would like to give the telecoms watchdog greater powers to enable it to serve as regulator for the likes of Facebook, Google, Twitter, Snapchat and TikTok. The aim is to protect internet users from "harmful and illegal content" while maintaining free speech.
Facebook Messenger Kids now lets parents view their kids' chat history and remotely log them out
Facebook has announced a raft of changes to its Messenger Kids service, giving parents more control and oversight over what their children are able to do.
Parents are now about to see 30 days' worth of chat logs as well as details of the types of conversation they are having with different contacts. Other new features include the ability to see images that have been shared, and also to remotely log their child out of chat sessions using the Parent Dashboard.
Facebook promises to give users more control over their privacy... again
Today is Data Privacy Day, and Facebook is using the occasion to try to convince its users that it cares about their privacy.
The social network says that it recognizes there is a lot of work to do to improve privacy protections, but that's not going to stop the company from trying to make it seem as though it doesn't represent a massive invasion of privacy. As part of its latest PR campaign, Facebook will encourage users to review their privacy settings as well as launching the Off-Facebook Activity tool globally.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker lands in Facebook Messenger
It's that time of year again: time for a new Star Wars movie. Inevitably, this means there is lots of marketing and a lot of tie-ins, and Facebook is never one to miss out on a trend.
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker is here, and as such Facebook Messenger is getting something of a Star Wars makeover, with new themes, reactions, stickers and augmented reality effects. Facebook says that they are "limited-edition Messenger features" -- so move quickly, you must.
New Any.do integration lets you create tasks and reminders in WhatsApp
While WhatsApp is primarily a communication tool, a new integration from Any.do also makes it possible to extend the capabilities of the chat app to create tasks and reminders using natural language.
As WhatsApp is often used in both the business and personal worlds to discuss a set up meetings, appointments and get-togethers, the ability to set reminders at the same time as discussing plans makes perfect sense. Like Any.do and WhatsApp themselves, the new feature is cross-platform, and can be found on iOS, Android, Mac, Windows and the web.
Facebook faces European probe over data collection
It is not just Google which is coming under the scrutiny of the European Commission – the European antitrust regulator have announced that they are also looking into the data collection practices of Facebook.
Just as with Google, the Commission has sent out preliminary questionnaires as part of an investigation into how Facebook collects and monetizes its data.
Facebook launches data portability tool to allow users to transfer photos and videos to Google Photos
Embracing the notion of data portability, Facebook has launched a new tool that lets users transfer their photos and videos from Facebook to other online services.
The social network is kicking things off by making it possible to transfer data from Facebook to Google Photos. It comes as part of Facebook's participation in the open-source Data Transfer Project and the ability to transfer to other services will be added soon.
Facebook Viewpoints will pay you money to complete surveys, but you shouldn't do it
I suppose there is nothing inherently wrong with handing over your data to big corporations -- as long as you do so willingly. Look, there are several "free" services online these days, such as Facebook, Gmail, and YouTube that many people use daily. These services aren't really free, however, as your data is largely the price of admission.
For those without actual disposable income, this data is a valuable commodity that they can use to trade for services -- it opens doors to some. With that said, it can be argued that this is essentially taking advantage of low income people. Similarly, this is one of the reasons it is illegal to sell your organs in the USA -- you'd have poor people transferring kidneys to the wealthy just to pay the rent.
The Facebook app could be secretly using your iPhone camera behind your back
Facebook is hardy a name that synonymous with privacy, and a newly discovered issue with the iOS version of the Facebook app does nothing to improve the situation.
Web designer Joshua Maddux was alarmed to find that the app was secretly using the camera on his iPhone as he scrolled through his Facebook feed. The problem has been confirmed by others, but it appears to only affects certain iPhones and certain versions of iOS.
Facebook Pay launches in the US, with payment options in Facebook, Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram
Facebook has launched a new payment service that can be used to send money and buy goods and services from within its apps -- and it's nothing to do with Libra.
The service is called Facebook Pay; it's available in the US for now, but it will expand into more countries in due course. The service allows for payments to be made in Facebook, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp and Instagram. Given the social network's reputation for privacy, it remains to be seen whether people trust it as much as the likes of Google Pay and Apple Pay.
New Facebook logo is bad
Facebook might be a total privacy dumpster fire that the Russians used as a tool to help elect Donald Trump as President of The United States (allegedly), but it is forever a part of pop culture. Its blue color scheme and lowercase "f" are undeniably iconic. And so, despite all of Facebook's privacy failures over the years, hundreds of millions of people continue to use it daily -- even though those users may not trust it. For instance, I despise the social network, but continue to check it daily to keep in touch with family -- I am deeply ashamed of myself.
In an attempt to rejuvenate its tainted image, Facebook is changing its corporate logo -- not the app icons, apparently. Since the company literally has billions of dollars at its disposal, you are probably thinking the new design is a timeless work of art. Sadly, you would be very wrong, as it is one of the laziest and most unimaginative designs in the history of corporate branding. Seriously, folks, it looks like no effort was put into it. It is literally just "FACEBOOK" in all caps.
Twitter bans all political ads, and the world waits to see if Facebook will follow suit
Jack Dorsey has announced that Twitter is implementing a ban on all political advertising on its network. The move comes after Facebook said it would not ban political ads, but Dorsey believes that the ability to reach a large audience with political messages "should be earned, not bought".
While the ban is a global one, the impact is likely to be felt most strongly in the US where spending on political campaigning is huge -- and whoever spends the most money has a tendency to fare better. The manager of the Trump 2020 campaign, Brad Parscale, has dismissed Twitter's decision as "yet another attempt by the left to silence Trump and conservatives".
One year on from the Facebook data breach -- what has changed? [Q&A]
One year ago this week Facebook suffered a massive data breach that prompted the company to reset access for around 90 million accounts.
A year on from this event what has been done to make users' data more secure and are people becoming more aware of the risks to their privacy from using social networks and other sites? We spoke to Fouad Khalil VP of compliance at SecurityScorecard to discuss these things and more.
What the 'Summer of Outages' showed us, and what we can do about it
Summer 2019 was a rough one for the internet, with systemic outages occurring frequently and in quick succession.
Some of these outages were caused by internal errors, others external, but two overriding causes emerged: greater network complexity and the frequency and pace of code change. In aggregate, these outages serve as a painful reminder of just how fragile the internet is, especially as networks and services grow increasingly interconnected and co-reliant.
Facebook may know when you're having sex
Few people would argue with the assertion that Facebook knows a lot about its users. The social network is hard to avoid, but could it really know when you have sex?
The answer, it seems, is yes. This is not -- you'll be very pleased to hear -- because Facebook is listening to you or using your webcam to spy on you. Rather it is down to period-tracking apps. A study by Privacy International shows that a number of apps used to track menstrual cycles can share a huge amount of highly personal information with the social media company.
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