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Zuckerberg Was Warned on Social Media Addiction + More
Zuckerberg Was Warned on Social Media Addiction, Filing Says
Employees at Meta Platforms Inc. and ByteDance Inc. were aware of the harmful effects of their platforms on young children and teenagers but disregarded the information or in some cases sought to undermine it, according to claims in a court filing.
The revelations were disclosed in a lawsuit over social media addiction that had been filed previously but with key portions sealed from public view. An unredacted version filed over the weekend in federal court in Oakland, California, offers details about how much engineers and others, including Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, knew about the harms of social media and their misgivings about it.
The case in Oakland comprises a collection of scores of complaints filed across the U.S. on behalf of adolescents and young adults who allege that Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat and Google’s YouTube caused them to suffer anxiety, depression, eating disorders and sleeplessness. More than a dozen suicides also have been blamed on the companies, based on claims that they knowingly designed algorithms that drew children down dangerous and addictive paths. Several public school districts have filed suits, too, alleging they can’t fulfill their educational mission while students are coping with mental-health crises.
“These never-before-seen documents show that social media companies treat the crisis in youth mental health as a public relations issue rather than an urgent societal problem brought on by their products,” according to a statement by the three plaintiffs’ lawyers leading the lawsuit, Lexi Hazam, Previn Warren and Chris Seeger. “This includes burying internal research documenting these harms, blocking safety measures because they decrease ‘engagement,’ and defunding teams focused on protecting youth mental health.”
U.S. Government Agencies May Have Been Double Billed for Projects in Wuhan, China, Records Indicate; Probe Launched
The U.S. government may have made duplicate payments for projects at labs in Wuhan, China, through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), according to records reviewed by CBS News.
“What I’ve found so far is evidence that points to double billing, potential theft of government funds. It is concerning, especially since it involves dangerous pathogens and risky research,” said Diane Cutler, a former federal investigator with over two decades of experience combating white-collar crime and healthcare fraud.
Cutler found evidence of possible double payments as she investigated U.S. government grants that supported high-risk research in China leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic. She was hired by Republican Sen. Roger Marshall, who took her records to USAID and the internal watchdog at USAID, which launched a new probe, details of which have not been previously reported.
Cutler said she has viewed over 50,000 documents, and that the U.S. government may have made duplicate payments for possible medical supplies, equipment, travel and salaries. Sources told CBS News that tens of millions of dollars could be involved.
Tech Investor David Sacks Predicts Next Stage of Silicon Valley Bank Crisis
Tech investor David Sacks has warned that regional banks will suffer from the ripple effects of the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) as deposits will be moved to banks that are “too big to fail.”
Talking about the meltdown of the 40-year-old, California-headquartered bank on The Megyn Kelly Show, Sacks said: “It’s not about SVB anymore. It’s about the 20 banks and the cascade that comes next.”
Sacks claimed that JPMorgan Chase, the largest bank in the U.S. and currently the world’s largest bank by market capitalization, will benefit from the shake-up of the financial market which is likely to follow the meltdown of SVB. “Do you know where all these deposits are going from all these regional banks? They are flooding into the top four banks,” he said.
“If the Fed is not being clear that your deposits are safe, if you have any doubt about that, if there is a one percent chance that you might lose your money, why wouldn’t you go to a ‘too big to fail’ bank? This is the problem.”
Senators Unconcerned Over Economic Impact as They Move Toward TikTok Ban
As the Senate moves closer toward providing the Biden Administration with the power to ban Chinese-owned TikTok over national security concerns with the wildly popular visual social media app, an effort first initiated in the twilight of Donald Trump‘s presidency, there seems to be little concern in the upper chamber over the impact such a ban could have on U.S. commerce.
TikTok boasts more than 100 million American users — nearly one-third of the total population. And with this popularity, it has emerged as a prominent fixture within the American economy. According to a May 2021 Adweek-Morning Consult survey, 49% of TikTok users said they have purchased a product or service after seeing it promoted, advertised or reviewed on the app.
Newsweek asked members of the 12-person bipartisan group drafting the Restricting the Emergence of Security Threats that Risk Information and Communications Technology (RESTRICT) Act how they’re weighing the economic considerations of users who do business on TikTok as they move forward with the bill.
“Remove the platform, and other platforms will step up to the plate,” Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, a member of the working group, told Newsweek. “We have to have American control.” Manchin’s opinion on the matter mirrored that of other lawmakers: National security concerns posed by TikTok outweigh its role in the U.S. economy, and other American social media platforms should have the ability to fill a TikTok void.
Michigan Governor Admits COVID Lockdowns Went Too Far
Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer (D) admitted on Sunday that her administration’s pandemic-era lockdown policies went too far, such as her April 2020 executive order barring most stores from selling gardening supplies, including seeds and plants, to Americans who wanted to grow their own fruits and vegetables.
“People said ‘oh, she’s outlawed seeds.’ It was February in Michigan, no one was planting anyway,” she continued (except it was in April). “But that being said, some of those policies I look back and think, you know, maybe that was a little more than what we needed to do.”
Whitmer’s office even published a list of prohibited items deemed “not necessary to sustain or protect life,” which couldn’t be sold during the height of the pandemic, and which required that businesses physically restrict customers from certain areas of stores, or remove nonessential items — including gardening items, flooring materials, furniture and paint.
Whitmer’s order even banned travel from one residence to another, including vacation properties, rental properties, or second homes within the state.
Law Group Alleges Stanford Fired Doctor for Criticizing COVID Policies: ‘Engaged in Employment Discrimination’
In Santa Clara, California, the Dhillon Law Group on Thursday filed a complaint against Stanford Health Care alleging that a doctor’s resignation was forced due to criticizing COVID-19 policies such as school closures, mask mandates and vaccine mandates.
Dhillon Law Group said further that Dr. Ram Duriseti made the decision not to get a COVID booster shot based on his analysis of the vaccine trial data, prior infection and pre-existing medical conditions.
The law group also claims that Stanford Health Care overlooked Dr. Duriseti’s non-compliance with its booster requirement, allowing him to continue to work in the pediatric emergency room.
Dhillon Law Group said that Stanford Health Care terminated Dr. Duriseti’s employment by “unilaterally converting his status to voluntary resignation” based on a “late and selective” enforcement of its booster mandate.
Here Are the Stadiums That Are Keeping Track of Your Face
In recent months, Madison Square Garden earned headlines for using facial recognition technology to ban or kick out people with tickets to their events. A Long Island attorney was removed from a Knicks game in December after getting flagged by the software. In January, a loyal Rangers fan was barred from watching his beloved team.
The use of facial recognition technology at sports stadiums goes far beyond MSG. I’ve tracked at least 20 other venues and stadiums across the country — including college sports venues — that have used this technology on their attendees, usually to admit them through the gates, although it’s unclear just how broadly this technology can be used by venues if they are inclined.
There are almost certainly many more, according to experts who say the lack of transparency about the use of technology has obscured its spread. It represents an extension of the surveillance network in private spaces that helps to amplify the power of law enforcement.
Privacy experts are also worried about the way data can be shared with law enforcement and the expanding surveillance network it creates. “It’s harder [for law enforcement] to set up in private locations, but the companies are kind of doing it for them,” said Katie Kinsey, chief of staff of the Policing Project at NYU Law. “Oftentimes, law enforcement only needs to ask these companies to hand it over; there’s no process that is required.”
It’s Been 3 Years Since COVID Lockdowns. But We Still Haven’t Learned From These 3 Mistakes
As the COVID pandemic reaches the three-year mark, and the public perception of a pandemic mindset finally fades, it is high time to review the mistakes that were made. We can find a pattern to learn from, especially as it applies to the government’s reaction. Themes that unfortunately characterize the response are dogma, dictum, mandate, censorship and so-called misinformation, as well as insensitivity to the collateral damage of interventions.
I have had unfettered access to Dr. Robert Redfield, former CDC director and one of the top virologists in the U.S. throughout the pandemic via multiple interviews and conversations. Redfield was curious about the possibility of a lab origin of SARS-CoV-2 from the beginning.
I wrote about the limited effectiveness of masks for the Wall Street Journal back in May 2020. Even in the OR, where they are used routinely, the proof is scant. But as the pandemic wore on, studies from Mass General Hospital, Bangladesh, and elsewhere, did show some effectiveness of masks in population control of viral spread. The Department of Defense used a simulation study to show they decreased spread on planes. But there were limitations.
As I wrote in USA Today in January 2021, the U.S. was an outlier when it came to not counting immunity from infection as a form of protection. In fact, Israel and the European Union allowed proof of infection (as well as vaccination) as a pass for entry to crowded places for six months afterward.
The Possibility of the Digital Euro
We have seen the emergence of cryptocurrencies from private actors and the concept of Central Bank Digital Currencies (CBDCs) take hold globally. In this context, we need to consider how best to ensure our common currency — the euro — can keep pace with these developments and continue to meet the needs of our citizens and businesses. Hence, the possibility of the digital euro.
For many observers, the central question is: What makes a digital euro any different, or better, than the many innovative digital solutions already available? And the answer to this lies in “central bank money” — or “fiat currency.”
So, at the heart of the digital euro project is the objective to maintain the link between citizens and central bank money. For as a CBDC, the digital euro would be central bank money, convertible, one-to-one, with euro banknotes.
This conversation around a digital euro, which began in earnest when the ECB launched its investigation in 2021, has quickly moved from being a possibility to a probability. And while a final decision on whether to launch won’t be made for several years, it’s increasingly looking like a case of not if but when.
China to Reopen to Tourists, Resume All Visas Wednesday
China will reopen its borders to tourists and resume issuing all visas Wednesday as it tries to revive tourism and its economy following a three-year halt during the COVID-19 pandemic.
China is one of the last major countries to reopen its borders to tourists. The announcement Tuesday came after it declared a “decisive victory” over COVID-19 in February.
All types of visas will resume from Wednesday. Visa-free entry also will resume at destinations such as Hainan island as well as for cruise ships entering Shanghai that had no visa requirement before COVID-19.
Google Is About to Unleash AI for Gmail and Google Docs
Google announced it’s finally unleashing its generative AI tools Tuesday, bringing a set of features to Gmail and Google Docs that will automatically create drafts based on simple prompts. Google will also add new AI capabilities to its business products, including Google Cloud and a new API for developers
There’s no question AI is going to change the world, the only question is how much. Google CEO Sundar Pichai once offered a preview of his thinking. “AI is one of the most important things humanity is working on,” Pichai said in 2018. “It is more profound than, I dunno, electricity or fire.”
The heads of giant tech companies often make big, meaningless statements, but Pichai isn’t one of them. Where Tim Cook might tell you a shiny new iPad screen is going to change the world, Google’s CEO tends to be pretty reserved.
Pichai has been less hyperbolic as his company’s AI work shifts in the direction of actual products, but as Google focuses on technology that its leader compares to the invention of fire, it’s worth pausing to consider what that actually means. That’s especially true when Google is in a better position than any other company to introduce AI on a massive scale.
How Does a Bank Collapse in 48 Hours? + More
How Does a Bank Collapse in 48 Hours? A Timeline of the Silicon Valley Bank Fall
The go-to bank for U.S. tech startups came rapidly unglued, leaving its high-powered customers and investors in limbo. Silicon Valley Bank, facing a sudden bank run and capital crisis, collapsed Friday morning and was taken over by federal regulators.
It was the largest failure of a U.S. bank since Washington Mutual in 2008. While relatively unknown outside of Silicon Valley, SVB was among the top 20 American commercial banks, with $209 billion in total assets at the end of last year, according to the FDIC. In short, SVB encountered a classic run on the bank.
Despite initial panic on Wall Street, analysts said SVB’s collapse is unlikely to set off the kind of domino effect that gripped the banking industry during the financial crisis. No later than Monday morning, all insured depositors will have full access to their insured deposits, according to the FDIC. It will pay uninsured depositors an “advance dividend within the next week.”
So, while a broader contagion is unlikely, smaller banks that are disproportionately tied to cash-strapped industries like tech and crypto may be in for a rough ride, according to Ed Moya, the senior market analyst at Oanda. “Everyone on Wall Street knew that the Fed’s rate-hiking campaign would eventually break something, and right now that is taking down small banks,” Moya said on Friday.
When Censorship Fails: Two-Thirds of U.S. Adults Think COVID Likely Started in a Lab
As Statista’s Anna Fleck notes, three years on and much has changed, including opinions on how the virus started, with one origin theory having taken particular hold in the United States.
According to the latest survey carried out by The Economist and YouGov, a majority of U.S. adults now think that COVID originated in a laboratory in China, whether intentionally or as a chance mutation. As Statista’s chart shows, 66% of U.S. respondents thought this theory was either probably or definitely true.
Despite conflicting theories, and the effort to completely censor any thought other than the official line, the exact origin story of the COVID-19 virus actually remains unknown. While the U.S. Department of Energy has said that COVID could have come from a lab leak in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the organization has admitted to having “low confidence” in its findings. The other main theory under discussion is that the virus could have jumped from animals to humans, for example in an animal market.
China has responded to the lab leak report by saying that the U.S. is politicizing the debate.
Merchant Marine Academy Rescinds COVID Vax Mandate After Post Report
The U.S. Merchant Marine Academy canceled its COVID-19 vaccine mandate on Friday — two days after The Post broke the story of its ongoing denial of all exemption requests from potential midshipmen.
“As of March 10, 2023, [USMMA] has rescinded the requirement that midshipmen be vaccinated against COVID-19,” a U.S. Maritime Administration spokesperson told The Post.
While all Defense Department military academies lifted their vaccine mandates in January after congressional Republicans demanded the Pentagon end the requirement as part of the 2023 National Defense Authorization Act, the USMMA was not covered by that action since it is administered by the Maritime Administration, which falls under the Department of Transportation.
All Travelers to the U.K. — Including From the EU and U.S. — Will Need Pre-Authorization by 2025
The U.K. will require all visa-exempt travelers to apply for digital travel authorization before entering the country, in a move regarded as the biggest shake-up of its border force rules in decades.
People holding passports that currently arrive in the country without pre-vetting — including European Union citizens and U.S., Canadian, Japanese, Australian, New Zealand and other nationals — will all need to apply and pay for Electronic Travel Authorization. The scheme is set to be fully rolled out by the end of 2024.
The European Union is set to launch its own digital travel authorization scheme, called ETIAS, for visa-exempt nationals in 2024. It will enable travel within 30 countries. Applications will be made online or via an app. Those with biometric passports will scan them using their phone, and may also need to take a “dynamic selfie,” involving movement, to submit an image of their face. They will also answer a set of questions.
It is understood the U.K. has ambitions to eventually require all travelers to submit fingerprint biometrics ahead of travel and is working on a scheme that would see this submitted by smartphone.
Milford Church Files Lawsuit Against Multiple CT State Departments Over Vaccine Mandate
Milford Christian Church has filed a lawsuit against multiple state departments in Connecticut, claiming a newer law violates their First Amendment rights. Listed in the lawsuit is the Connecticut State Department of Education, the Connecticut Office of Early Childhood, and the Connecticut Department of Public Health.
The law, An Act Concerning Immunizations, was altered in 2021 to remove all vaccine exemptions that are not medical. That means all students in daycare, PreK, and K-12 must get their required vaccines for school.
“That they had a choice between compelling their students to vaccinate, expelling them if they didn’t, or facing the force-able state closure,” said Cameron Atkinson, an attorney with Atkinson Law, representing the church.
In a press conference on Friday, Atkinson said the school refuses to comply, standing by its rights. “Our message to the state is clear. We will obey God first,” Atkinson said.
B.C. Ending COVID Vaccine Mandate for Public Service, but Not Healthcare Workers
As of April 3, workers in British Columbia’s public service will no longer be required to be vaccinated against COVID-19.
Healthcare workers, however, will still need to be vaccinated. The ministry said the COVID-19 policy will remain in place for people working in settings with provincial health officer orders or other vaccination requirements.
B.C. implemented the mandatory vaccine policy for the public service in November 2021. The B.C. Public Service agency said a total of 314 employees were terminated for non-compliance and approximately 175 workers were currently on unpaid leave under the policy.
“People who were terminated while the policy was in place can reapply for employment and would be considered new hires,” it said in an email.
After 20 Years, the Department of Homeland Security Is a Money-Guzzling Failure
Twenty years ago this month, the U.S. government took a sharp turn toward surveillance, racial profiling and an immigration policy based on fear.
In March 2003, the newly christened Department of Homeland Security, or DHS, opened its doors. The department took everything from immigration enforcement and counterterrorism to airport security and disaster response under one gargantuan bureaucracy.
Despite these wide-ranging missions, the department’s unifying logic in the post-9/11 era has been to wage the so-called war on terror at home. The result has been systemic abuse of minority communities, a dangerous militarization of American life and a massive waste of money that sapped resources from addressing the real threats to our homeland.
Jeremy Hunt: Britain Has ‘a Lot to Learn’ From Swedish Approach to COVID Rules
Jeremy Hunt has said Britain has “a lot to learn” from Sweden’s decision not to impose a mandatory COVID lockdown.
The Chancellor acknowledged that the Scandinavian country had achieved a similar outcome to the U.K. without having to resort to draconian rules. Throughout the pandemic, Stockholm stuck to a voluntary approach to restrictions, relying on people to exercise personal responsibility.
His remarks come as The Telegraph reveals how Boris Johnson was warned by Britain’s top civil servant over the impact of lockdowns. Just days before the then-prime minister shut down the country for a second time, Simon Case, the cabinet secretary, told him doing so would be “terrible for other outcomes.”
ChatGPT Is Now Being Used to Make Scams Much More Dangerous
Scams on the internet might get a lot more dangerous now, thanks to fraudsters having unobstructed access to ChatGPT, the AI-powered chatbot that never seems to leave the headlines.
That’s according to a report published earlier this month by cybersecurity researchers Norton. In it, the company laid out three key ways threat actors could abuse ChatGPT to make internet scams more effective: through deep fake content generation, phishing at scale and faster malware creation.
Norton also argues that the ability to generate “high-quality misinformation or disinformation at scale” could assist bot farms in stoking division more efficiently, allowing threat actors to “sow mistrust and shape narratives in different languages” with ease.
Ring Car Cam Hands-On: Amazon’s Video Security Ecosystem Hits America’s Highways
Amazon’s evolution from an omnipresent shopping platform to an omnipresent surveillance platform continues apace, having drastically expanded its line of Ring security camera systems in recent years. Nowadays, the company offers video doorbells, exterior cameras, interior cameras, flying cameras, lighting systems, alarm systems and vehicle security packages — the lattermost of which is why we are here today. I put a Ring camera in my car.
Ring’s business decisions have made very clear that it is on the side of the police — even if the homeowners themselves aren’t — freely volunteering data to, and often partnering with, law enforcement agencies around the country.
When asked whether safeguards have been put in place to prevent law enforcement from surreptitiously spying through the Car Cam, Ring’s spokesperson noted, “Ring builds products and services for our customers, not law enforcement.
When parked, Car Cam only records when the smart sensors detect an incident (such as a collision or broken window) or if the device owner or Shared User initiates Live View.” What happens to that data once it’s off the device and in Ring’s cloud servers was not made clear.
Which Stores Are Scanning Your Face? No One Knows. + More
Which Stores Are Scanning Your Face? No One Knows.
In early February, I spent $171.59 to see the Rangers play the Canucks at Madison Square Garden. I had no plans to watch the hockey game. I just wanted to find out whether my guest, Tia Garcia, a personal injury lawyer, could get into the building. We got in the security line and walked through the metal detector. Then, as Ms. Garcia turned to pick up her bag from the conveyor belt, a security guard asked her to step aside and show her driver’s license. “Am I in trouble?” she asked.
Five minutes later, the security manager arrived to officially kick Ms. Garcia out. Even though she had expected it to happen, Ms. Garcia found the deployment of facial recognition technology to punish corporate enemies alarming. So did local lawmakers. The City Council convened a hearing last month to discuss how Madison Square Garden and other local businesses were using the technology.
There were lots of questions to be asked: Who is using it? Who are the people they’re trying to keep out of their businesses? What do they do when the technology gets it wrong and flags a look-alike? Mayor Eric Adams had recently encouraged businesses to use facial recognition to fight shoplifting. Who answered his call? If you shoplift once, are you barred for life?
No one at the hearing knew which other businesses were using the technology. So I decided to find out. New York City has a quirky new law that makes it the only municipality in the country where a business scanning faces has to post a sign telling customers that it is doing so. After I left the meeting, I set off on a miles-long walk in search of those signs. They weren’t where I expected them to be.
The Pentagon Is Funding Experiments on Animals to Recreate ‘Havana Syndrome’
The Defense Department is funding experiments on animals to determine if radio frequency waves could be the source of the mysterious ailment referred to as “Havana Syndrome” that has afflicted hundreds of U.S. government personnel in recent years, according to public documents and three people familiar with the effort.
This news of the ongoing animal testing, which has not previously been reported, comes after the Office of the Director of National Intelligence determined last week that there is no credible evidence that a foreign adversary wielding a weapon caused the health incidents. Despite the assessment, the Pentagon is continuing to examine that possibility, as POLITICO reported.
The Army in September awarded Wayne State University in Michigan a $750,000 grant to study the effects of radio frequency waves on ferrets, which have brains similar to humans, according to information on the grant posted on USASpending.gov. The aim is to determine whether this exposure induces similar symptoms to those experienced by U.S. government personnel in Havana, Cuba, and China, the documents show. Symptoms have been described as severe headaches, temporary loss of hearing, vertigo and other problems similar to traumatic brain injury.
There is a “strong rationale” that the Havana Syndrome was caused by “occult exposure to radio frequency (RF) waves,” according to the abstract, which notes that the Russians have used radio waves to clandestinely eavesdrop on U.S. government personnel since the Cold War, when the practice was known as the “Moscow Signal.”
‘Weaponization’ Subcommittee Members Spar Over ‘Twitter Files’
House Democrats and Republicans sparred Thursday over how Twitter handles government requests for Twitter to review posts, in the second House committee showdown over reports known as the “Twitter Files” released by several journalists on the platform.
Republicans called in Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger, two of the journalists who released threads of the files, as witnesses in a hearing for the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Weaponization of the Federal Government. The hearing ramped up House GOP leaders’ accusations that tech companies are making content censorship decisions with an anti-conservative bias.
In the most heated moments, Democrats complained that another Taibbi “Twitter Files” thread was just posted shortly before the hearing started and not provided to them. They also pressed the journalists on how they obtained the files. Democrats on the panel during Thursday’s hearing pressed Taibbi and Shellenberger over the scope of the information they had access to, and the terms they agreed to when posting them.
But Taibbi would not say, despite being pressed by both Plaskett and Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas), whether Musk was the person who gave him that information.
House Republicans Pass Bill to Ban Federal Officials From Pressuring Tech Platforms on Content
House Republicans passed a bill on Thursday that seeks to ban federal officials from promoting censorship, a measure Republicans brought to the floor in response to what they say are efforts by the Biden administration to persuade social media companies to suppress certain information.
The measure titled the Protecting Speech from Government Interference Act was passed in a party-line 219-206 vote. The legislation specifically calls for prohibiting “federal employees from advocating for censorship of viewpoints in their official capacity,” which includes recommending that a third party should “take any action to censor speech.”
Lawmakers approved a number of amendments to the bill, including one that would prohibit law enforcement officials from sharing information with social media companies unless it pertains to speech not protected by the First Amendment — such as obscenity, fraud or incitement to imminent lawless action.
Telehealth Startup Cerebral Shared Millions of Patients’ Data With Advertisers
Cerebral has revealed it shared the private health information, including mental health assessments, of more than 3.1 million patients in the United States with advertisers and social media giants like Facebook, Google and TikTok.
The telehealth startup, which exploded in popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic after rolling lockdowns and a surge in online-only virtual health services, disclosed the security lapse in a filing with the federal government that it shared patients’ personal and health information who used the app to search for therapy or other mental health care services.
Cerebral said that it collected and shared names, phone numbers, email addresses, dates of birth, IP addresses and other demographics, as well as data collected from Cerebral’s online mental health self-assessment, which may have also included the services that the patient selected, assessment responses and other associated health information.
Cerebral was sharing patients’ data with tech giants in real-time by way of trackers and other data-collecting code that the startup embedded within its apps. Tech companies and advertisers, like Google, Facebook and TikTok, allow developers to include snippets of their custom-built code, which allows the developers to share information about their app users’ activity with the tech giants, often under the guise of analytics but also for advertising.
A Former TikTok Employee Tells Congress the App Is Lying About Chinese Spying
A former risk manager at TikTok has met with congressional investigators to share his concerns that the company’s plan for protecting U.S. user data is deeply flawed, pointing to evidence that could inflame lawmakers’ suspicion of the app at a moment when many are considering a nationwide ban.
In an exclusive interview with The Washington Post, the former employee, who worked for six months in the company’s Trust and Safety division ending in early 2022, said the issues could leave data from TikTok’s more than 100 million U.S. users exposed to China-based employees of its parent company ByteDance, even as the company races to implement new safety rules walling off domestic user information.
His allegations threaten to undermine this $1.5 billion restructuring plan, known as Project Texas, which TikTok has promoted widely in Washington as a way to neutralize the risk of data theft or misuse by the Chinese government.
They could also fuel speculation that the wildly popular short-video app remains vulnerable to having its video-recommendation algorithm and user data distorted for propaganda or espionage. U.S. authorities have not shared evidence that the Chinese government has accessed TikTok’s data or code.
The Importance of Free Speech in the Medical Profession, and the Dangers of Censorship
“More than ever, society needs all clinicians to step up and speak up. Furthermore, professional organizations and state medical boards must make more robust use of their powers to take appropriate disciplinary action against clinicians who violate professional standards by spreading health misinformation,” wrote Allison M. Whelan in an article published by the AMA Journal of Ethics on March 1, 2023.
These two sentences seem to me to be in contradiction to one another. In essence, they require physicians to voice their opinions but also to face disciplinary action if their opinions happen not to coincide with the received opinions of their time. This is a very odd way of going about stimulating medical debate, which is so necessary to progress, to say nothing of freedom itself.
What counts as misinformation isn’t straightforward, as the author of the paper I have quoted acknowledges, but she’s especially concerned that those doctors connected in some way with politics or government shouldn’t pass on misinformation, as they’re likely to be seen as being in authority. The examples of misinformation that she gives are unfortunate, however.
For example, she quotes Dr. Scott Atlas, a radiologist, who wrote in a tweet that masks didn’t work in protecting against or preventing the spread of COVID-19, this going against “guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”
But guidance from the CDC isn’t in itself evidence of the justification of that guidance, and a recent Cochrane review (the nearest to a disinterested and objective review of medical evidence as is to be found in this wicked world) came to the conclusion that evidence in favor of masks was lacking.
Meta Is Working on a Twitter Killer, but With a Twist
Twitter hasn’t been doing too well lately, and now the sharks are coming. Facebook‘s parent company Meta is working on a standalone, text-based social network app that will be both a rival to Twitter and its decentralized competitor, Mastodon, at the same time.
Moneycontrol broke the news, and Meta confirmed the news, though the company didn’t share too many details about what it’s working on.
“We’re exploring a standalone decentralized social network for sharing text updates. We believe there’s an opportunity for a separate space where creators and public figures can share timely updates about their interests,” a Meta spokesperson told Moneycontrol.
While the app, codenamed P92, might still be in the early stages of development, we now know it’s going to be standalone, meaning it’s not just a feature tacked onto Instagram.
If You Think Your Health Is a Private Matter, See What’s Happening to Your Data + More
If You Think Your Health Is a Private Matter, See What’s Happening to Your Data
Seeking help for substance abuse. Monitoring your glucose levels. Signing up to get therapy through virtual visits. Sharing symptoms to a portal that sets up a doctor visit. Ordering prescriptions online.
There’s an enormous trove of personal health information people now feed or tap into digital monitors, health apps, search engines and other online tools. If the same information were provided in your doctor’s office, your privacy would be safeguarded. If you’ve ever sat in a doctor’s waiting room filling out a multi-page questionnaire about your health status and history, you get the picture. But that’s not how the digitized health world works.
Instead, we have an ecosystem of abuse in which technology companies that have become central to the way people now access healthcare or monitor their health operate largely outside the federal law that requires doctors and other medical personnel, hospitals and insurers to protect an individual’s intimate health information.
That means tech companies can — and do — mine your digital data for clues about your health status, accessing information like prescriptions you have purchased and other health services you might have sought, and potentially link this information to your name, address, email address and other personally identifying information. The data can then be used by platforms including Facebook and Google to help advertisers target promotions or other communications to you.
Growth of AI in Mental Health Raises Fears of Its Ability to Run Wild
The rise of AI in mental healthcare has providers and researchers increasingly concerned over whether glitchy algorithms, privacy gaps and other perils could outweigh the technology’s promise and lead to dangerous patient outcomes.
Why it matters: As the Pew Research Center recently found, there’s widespread skepticism over whether using AI to diagnose and treat conditions will complicate a worsening mental health crisis.
Mental health apps are also proliferating so quickly that regulators are hard-pressed to keep up. The American Psychiatric Association estimates there are more than 10,000 mental health apps circulating on app stores. Nearly all are unapproved.
Driving the news: The fear is now concentrated around whether the technology is beginning to cross a line and make clinical decisions, and what the Food and Drug Administration is doing to prevent safety risks to patients.
The FBI Just Admitted It Bought U.S. Location Data
The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation has acknowledged for the first time that it purchased U.S. location data rather than obtaining a warrant. While the practice of buying people’s location data has grown increasingly common since the U.S. Supreme Court reined in the government’s ability to warrantlessly track Americans’ phones nearly five years ago, the FBI had not previously revealed ever making such purchases.
The disclosure came today during a U.S. Senate hearing on global threats attended by five of the nation’s intelligence chiefs. Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat, put the question of the bureau’s use of commercial data to its director, Christopher Wray: “Does the FBI purchase U.S. phone-geolocation information?”
Wray said his agency was not currently doing so, but he acknowledged that it had in the past. He also limited his response to data companies gathered specifically for advertising purposes.
U.S. Chamber of Commerce Says Congress Should Really Do Something About This AI Thing
Those pushing for AI regulation have a strange new ally. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the largest pro-business lobbying group in the country, released a report on generative artificial intelligence Thursday, calling on lawmakers to create some sort of regulation around the ballooning technology.
At the same time, the chamber’s report offers very few examples or specifics on where this regulation should go, save for a “risk-based approach” to regulating AI. While this could be the kind of real push lawmakers need to act on forming meaningful regulation, at this point, it seems poised to offer more limp regulation that won’t actually help some of the people most impacted by AI development.
In the report, chamber President and CEO David Hirschmann called for a more responsible and ethical deployment of AI, writing “for Americans to reap the benefits of AI, people must trust it.” The report noted AI is projected to add $13 trillion to global economic growth by 2030, but of course, economic crystal ball projections are less than reliable. The report also estimated that over the next 10 to 20 years, “virtually every business and government agency will use AI.”
Thousands of Unvaccinated Service Members Could Still Be Booted Over Rescinded COVID Policy
Thousands of military service members could still be discharged because they didn’t apply for a COVID-19 vaccination exemption — even though the U.S. Department of Defense rescinded its mandate in January.
Members of the House Armed Services Committee blasted the DOD’s handling of its mandate as 69,000 out of 2 million active service members never received a vaccine, according to data sent to Congress members last week.
Approximately 53,000 sought an exemption or accommodation, leaving about 16,000 who could be axed for noncompliance with the rescinded vaccine policy, according to data supplied by Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness Gilbert Cisneros in response to a letter from Reps. Mike Rogers, R-Ala., and Jim Banks, R-Ind.
Cisneros’ letter noted that roughly 8,100 service members have already been separated for not complying with the vaccine mandate, though the data did not specify how many of those applied for an exemption.
Banks grilled Cisneros during a recent hearing in which he cited a study from The Lancet that found natural immunity against COVID-19 is as effective as vaccination. Noting the novelty of the virus, Cisneros said “natural immunity is not something we believe in for this.”
Merchant Marine Academy Still Won’t Take COVID Vaccine Exemptions
Months after the Pentagon lifted its COVID-19 vaccine mandates, the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy has kept its requirement in place — denying all requests from potential midshipmen for religious or medical exemptions, The Post has learned.
In a Tuesday letter to the Kings Point academy’s superintendent, Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.) demanded the USMMA rescind the “blanket denial,” claiming it violates school officials’ oath to “support and defend the Constitution.”
“As of today, the USMMA’s website says that ‘neither medical nor religious exemption requests will be accepted or processed for vaccination requirements,’” he said.
Banks, a member of the Navy Reserve who served in Afghanistan and is currently chairman of the House Subcommittee on Military Personnel, added the mandate violates federal law, citing a Supreme Court ruling and 2017 executive order that “clearly states individuals with religious objections to certain forms of medical treatment are allowed to opt out of such treatment.”
COVID Generation Is ‘Less Smart’ as Result of Pandemic Lockdowns, Study Finds
The COVID generation is less smart as a result of lockdowns at the height of the pandemic, according to a new study. And researchers found no evidence that students have been able to make up the gap since schools started to fully re-open.
An entire generation of students had their education disrupted during the pandemic, with simulations predicting a learning loss equivalent to between 0.3 and 1.1 school years and a global learning loss of $10 trillion.
Now researchers have found that the deficit also extends to students’ intelligence, according to a study published in the journal PLOS ONE, published by the Public Library of Science. IQ tests carried out on students affected by COVID lockdowns found their scores were significantly lower than comparable students in previous generations, with a difference of 7.62 IQ points between students who took the test in 2020 and those who did it in 2002.
Testing the students again a year later, after schools had fully reopened, found no sign they were catching up. The tests were taken by students in grades seven, eight and nine in grammar schools in Germany in 2020, six months after the beginning of the lockdown and then again 10 months later.
Matt Hancock COVID Memoirs Censored Over Wuhan Lab Leak Comments
The Telegraph via MSN reported:
Matt Hancock was censored by the Cabinet Office over his concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic began with a lab leak in Wuhan, the Lockdown Files reveals. The former health secretary was told to tone down claims in his book because the Government feared it would “cause problems” with China.
Mr. Hancock wanted to say that the Chinese explanation — that the virus being discovered close to a government science lab in Wuhan was coincidental — “just doesn’t fly.” But, in correspondence from late last year and leaked to the Telegraph, the Cabinet Office told him that the Government’s position was that the original outbreak’s location was “entirely coincidental.”
It is the first time that the British position has been categorically stated. Mr. Hancock was warned that to differ from this narrative, which resembles China’s version of events, risked “damaging national security”.
In his book, Pandemic Diaries, Mr. Hancock also wanted to write that “Global fear of the Chinese must not get in the way of a full investigation into what happened” but this too was watered down.
San Francisco Police Officer ‘Separated’ for Refusing COVID Vaccine Champions Free Choice: ‘I Know Who I Am’
When COVID-19 vaccines became widely available in the spring of 2021, some businesses announced that if employees wanted to keep their jobs, they’d have to get the jab. Most people complied — but many did not.
The Mayo Clinic, New York City, United Airlines and many healthcare facilities nationwide were among the organizations that terminated employees who remained unvaccinated. Some law enforcement agencies also fired staffers who refused the vaccine — including the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD).
Joel Aylworth was among the SFPD officers who had to turn in their badges when they failed to comply with the vaccine mandate. “As a Christian, I don’t believe in injecting biological substances into my blood,” Aylworth told Fox News Digital in a phone interview. Aylworth said he also believed that as a healthy man in his 30s, he was not at risk for the adverse effects of COVID.
On Aug. 19, 2021, Aylworth filed for a religious exemption, he said. Aylworth’s exemption was approved by the SFPD’s human resources department, he said. Less than a month later, on Sept. 16, he received an email informing him that his original exemption was no longer valid.
After answering the second round of questions, Aylworth said he received another letter noting that his religious exemption was no longer valid based on his latest responses. “All 150 of us who were previously approved did not get approved this time around,” he said. “Everyone in the department got denied.”