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Instagram, Google See Surge in Reports of Online Child Abuse
Reports of child exploitation online increased at many of the biggest tech and social media firms over the last year, including Meta Platforms Inc.’s Instagram and Alphabet Inc.’s Google. TikTok, Amazon.com Inc.’s Twitch, Reddit Inc., and the chat apps Omegle and Discord Inc. also saw increases, according to a Tuesday report from the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
The U.S. child safety agency received over 32 million reports involving online enticement, child sexual abuse material and child sex trafficking in 2022 — some 2.7 million more than the year before.
While child sexual abuse material, or CSAM, was the largest category, there was an 82% increase in reports regarding online enticement. The center partially attributes the increase to financial “sextortion,” which involves targeting kids to share explicit photographs and blackmailing them for money.
Reports from Discord and Omegle more than quintupled. Google’s reports more than doubled to 2.1 million. TikTok, Twitch and Grindr also experienced sizable increases.
In Survey, Half of U.S. Parents Believe Social Media Is Harming Their Kids
U.S. News & World Report reported:
Half of U.S. parents think social media is bad for their kids’ mental health, a new survey reveals. The finding highlights growing concerns about how these platforms affect children’s and adolescents’ well-being, according to the On Our Sleeves Movement for Children’s Mental Health, which had the Harris Poll conduct the survey.
The program encourages parents to help their kids by talking regularly about how using social media makes their children feel.
Dr. Ariana Hoet, clinical director of On Our Sleeves and a pediatric psychologist at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Ohio, said, “Social media has the ability to increase anxiety and depression in children when used inappropriately, as well as potentially open them up to inappropriate sharing, hurtful language, bullying and more.”
The survey questioned more than 2,000 U.S. adults, including more than 700 parents of children younger than 18, in late March and early April.
Senators Revive Kids Online Safety Push as States Bypass Washington
Senate lawmakers this week are renewing a flurry of efforts to boost protections for kids online, which have languished on Capitol Hill as states have forged ahead with their own measures.
But despite gaining momentum in the Senate, the updated measures face familiar obstacles in the House, where leaders have been focusing on passing privacy protections for all consumers — not just kids.
Senators unveiled the revamped Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) with over two dozen co-sponsors on Tuesday, a show of force amid an increasingly crowded legislative landscape on children’s online safety.
But KOSA and the EARN IT Act, both co-led by Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), have become political lightning rods in Washington, with tech trade associations and digital rights groups expressing concern that the bills could hurt users’ personal privacy and free speech online. KOSA, they argue, would force companies to collect more data on kids, while EARN IT could force sites to crack down on sex education resources out of fear of liability for exposing users to lewd content.
Big Tech-Funded Groups Try to Kill Bills to Protect Children Online
At a March meeting in Annapolis, Md., that state lawmakers held to discuss proposals for new safety and privacy protections for children online, one local resident made a personal plea urging officials to reject the measure.
What Carl Szabo didn’t initially disclose in his two-minute testimony to the Maryland Senate Finance Committee: He is vice president and general counsel for NetChoice, a tech trade association that receives funding from tech giants including Amazon, Google and Facebook parent company Meta. NetChoice has vocally opposed the measure and already sued to block a similar law in California.
The session was one of dozens happening around the country this year as policymakers and consumer advocacy groups mount a sprawling push for new safeguards for children online, spurring legislation to tackle a recent groundswell of concerns that digital platforms may worsen mental health issues for young users.
The push has faced broad opposition from tech trade groups representing some of the United States’ biggest digital platforms, who have blitzed statehouses around the country in an effort to stymie the bills, even as many of their member or partner companies including Amazon remain largely mum. (Amazon founder Jeff Bezos owns The Washington Post.)
Google DeepMind Boss Predicts AI as Powerful as the Human Brain Could Arrive Within the Next Few Years, Report Says
AI that is as powerful as the human brain could arrive within the next few years, according to the boss of Google-owned AI lab DeepMind. The Wall Street Journal reported the news.
Demis Hassabis, CEO and co-founder of London-based DeepMind, believes artificial general intelligence (AGI) — a theoretical concept in the field that envisions AI matching the cognitive abilities of humans — is on the horizon as AI research accelerates.
The comments come as Google, which bought DeepMind for $500 million in 2014, is attempting to fortify its business by doubling down on AI as it seeks to fend off a challenge to its core search unit from Microsoft-backed ChatGPT developer OpenAI.
Hassabis is playing a central role in Google’s mission to advance its AI capabilities, having been announced last month as the leader of a newly formed unit at Google that brings DeepMind together with Google Brain, a separate AI research arm.
Groups Lobbying for COVID Vaccine Mandates Were Funded by Pfizer
Multiple organizations that pushed for COVID-19 vaccine mandates received funding from Pfizer, according to financial disclosures.
The Chicago Urban League President Karen Freeman-Wilson said in August 2021 that the benefits of mandates “far outweigh” concerns about them. She did not mention that her organization was on the receiving end of a $100,000 grant for a “vaccine safety and effectiveness campaign,” according to a Pfizer disclosure. That same month, the National Consumers League said it supported mandates imposed by governments and employers. The league received $75,000 from Pfizer in the third quarter of 2021 for “vaccine policy efforts.”
The American Academy of Pediatrics drew more than $250,000 from Pfizer in 2021, the bulk coming before the organization announced support for COVID-19 vaccine mandates for healthcare workers. The group claimed mandates would curb COVID-19 transmission and cases.
The American Pharmacists Association, American College of Preventive Medicine, Academy of Managed Care Pharmacy, American Society for Clinical Pathology, and the American College of Emergency Physicians also received grants from Pfizer before signing a letter that urged the Biden administration to impose COVID-19 vaccine mandates on private employers with 100 or more workers.
AI’s ‘Godfather’ Should Have Spoken Up Sooner
It is hard not to be worried when the so-called godfather of artificial intelligence, Geoffrey Hinton, says he is leaving Google and regrets his life’s work. Hinton, who made a critical contribution to AI research in the 1970s with his work on neural networks, told several news outlets this week that large technology companies were moving too fast on deploying AI to the public. Part of the problem was that AI was achieving human-like capabilities more quickly than experts had forecast. “That’s scary,” he told the New York Times.
Hinton’s concerns certainly make sense, but they would have been more effective if they had come several years earlier when other researchers who didn’t have retirement to fall back on were ringing the same alarm bells.
Tellingly, Hinton in a tweet sought to clarify how the New York Times characterized his motivations, worried that the article suggested he had left Google to criticize it. “Actually, I left so that I could talk about the dangers of AI without considering how this impacts Google,” he said. “Google has acted very responsibly.”
While Hinton’s prominence in the field might have insulated him from blowback, the episode highlights a chronic problem in AI research: Large technology companies have such a stranglehold on AI research that many of their scientists are afraid of airing their concerns for fear of harming their career prospects.
