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LeBron James, Durant Slam NYC Vax Mandate: ‘Makes Absolutely Zero Sense’
NBA stars Lebron James and Kevin Durant criticized New York City’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate for private-sector employees that bars Brooklyn Nets star Kyrie Irving from playing in home games.
The comments by James came shortly after Irving was seen sitting courtside at the Nets vs. Knicks game on Sunday, despite the point guard being prohibited from playing in home games since he is unvaccinated.
In New York City, the COVID-19 vaccine mandate for consumers was recently lifted amid decreasing virus case rates, but a vaccine mandate for private-sector employees remains in place. While Irving is not allowed to play home games for the Nets, he is allowed to practice with the team at their facility in Brooklyn. Other NBA players who are unvaccinated are also allowed to play games in New York City, but Irving is not.
In addition to James, Irving’s teammate, Durant, also criticized the city’s vaccine mandate after the point guard was seen courtside. “It’s ridiculous. I don’t understand it at all,” Durant said during a post-game press conference on Sunday. “It just feels like, at this point now, someone is trying to make a statement or point to flex their authority.”
These Schools Did Less to Contain COVID. Their Students Flourished.
As school systems around the country were battening down for their first remote start-of-school in the fall of 2020, the Lewis-Palmer district, in the suburbs of Colorado Springs, was embarking on another kind of experiment: Elementary students would be in class full time, sitting maskless at communal tables. The band program would resume in-person classes, saxophonists and flutists playing a few feet apart. The high school football teams would practice and compete.
In the country’s largest school systems, such as those in New York City, Los Angeles, D.C. and Chicago, teacher unions and concerned parents fought plans to reopen. Public health officials warned that social distancing would save lives, and schools responded by devising hybrid programs or simply sticking with virtual learning. But, over time, these measures also imposed costs: Today, students are contending with significant learning loss and mental health issues.
Thousands of school districts — typically small ones in conservative-leaning counties — reacted to the pandemic like Lewis Palmer District 38 did. Officials in this largely White and affluent school district of 6,600 students near the U.S. Air Force Academy argue they took the right approach to reopening schools. No child was hospitalized with the virus; two school system employees were admitted, though contact tracers did not determine where they contracted the virus, school officials said.
DuckDuckGo Updates Search Engine, Will Penalize Sites ‘Associated With Disinformation’
The search engine DuckDuckGo has begun penalizing sites linked to “Russian disinformation” amid the Russia–Ukraine war, according to the company’s CEO.
DuckDuckGo is an alternative to Google that has been growing in popularity in recent years in part because it doesn’t track users. Weinberg has in the past promised “unbiased results” as part of his pitch to people to switch from Google.
Some users quickly questioned the CEO’s update, including Tom Fitton, president of the Judicial Watch nonprofit. DuckDuckGo, “contrary to its implicit promises to the contrary, is now in the censorship business,” he wrote on Twitter. “Are there any search engines that respect users?”
Los Angeles Unified School District Says It’s Keeping Mask Mandate
Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) said it’s keeping its mask mandate in place — at least temporarily — even as California drops its requirement for masks in indoor public settings.
Several K-12 schools across the state dropped their face covering requirements Monday after the state lifted its mandate over the weekend.
LAUSD, the second-largest school district in the country, said it does not want to drop the mask requirement yet as it works towards a plan with partners, including teachers’ unions, to move away from mandates and towards “strongly recommending” masks indoors.
Mayor Lori Lightfoot Warns Police and Other City Employees Will Lose Pay if They Don’t Get 1st COVID Vaccine by Sunday
Mayor Lori Lightfoot will put Chicago Police officers and other city workers who don’t get their first dose of the COVID-19 vaccine by Sunday on non-disciplinary no-pay status, her administration said late Friday.
The city will also consider disciplining workers, though it will be dealt with on a case-by-case basis as the Lightfoot administration balances its public health policies with staffing problems in the police department.
Lightfoot’s latest pronouncement comes after the city won another round in court this week in its legal battle with the Chicago Fraternal Order of Police over the vaccine mandate. But she faces pressure not just from the police union — which has appealed the latest legal ruling and claims the mandate will results in an exodus of officers — but also from a group of aldermen still seeking to undo the rule.
Chicago Public Schools Will Still Require Masks in Some Settings; Mask-Optional Policy Begins Monday Despite CTU Opposition
Students in Chicago Public Schools (CPS) are slated to shift to a mask optional policy Monday, despite an agreement with the teachers union, which had successfully negotiated for the COVID-19 safeguard to remain in place through the end of the school year.
The vast majority of Illinois schools ended masking requirements late last month, following Gov. J.B. Pritzker’s halting of the school mask mandate and prompted by new federal guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But CPS officials had continued to uphold their mask mandate, in large part due to an agreement they’d reached with the Chicago Teachers Union following five days of canceled classes in January, after union members declined to teach in person due to safety concerns.
JPMorgan Rolls Back COVID Precautions Including Masking and Mandatory Testing as U.S. Cases Drop
JPMorgan Chase on Monday told its U.S. employees that the bank was rolling back several coronavirus precautions as cases continue to drop.
Wearing a mask at corporate buildings will be “completely voluntary” for workers starting today, regardless of their vaccination status, the bank said in the memo. Next month, the bank will stop mandatory testing for unvaccinated workers and will open up hiring to the unvaccinated, it added.
JPMorgan said New York City employees are still covered by the local vaccine mandate, and workers will need to continue logging responses into the bank’s vaccine program.
France Lifts COVID Rules on Unvaccinated, Mask Wearing
France lifted most COVID-19 restrictions on Monday, abolishing the need to wear face masks in most settings and allowing people who aren’t vaccinated back into restaurants, sports arenas and other venues.
Starting from Monday, people aren’t required anymore to show proof of vaccination to enter places like restaurants and bars, cinemas, theaters, fairs and to use interregional transport. The so-called vaccine pass had taken effect at the end of January.
In hospitals and nursing homes, unvaccinated people must provide a recent negative test or proof of recent recovery to enter. Wearing masks are no longer required in schools, businesses and offices. They remain mandatory on public transportation and at hospitals and other health facilities.
Chinese Stocks Continue to Melt Down as Spike in COVID Cases Spurs New Lockdowns and Threatens Global Supply Chain
Chinese stocks continued their decline on Monday, with the MSCI China ETF falling as much as 6% after a surge in COVID-19 cases led to lockdowns in areas including Shenzen and Shanghai.
Lockdowns in China are threatening its local economy and could exacerbate ongoing constraints in the global supply chain, as tech-hub Shenzen was targeted with lockdowns. Those lockdowns shut down factories operated by Foxconn that are used to assemble products for Apple, including the iPhone.
How Silicon Valley’s Russia Crackdown Proves Its Power — and Its Threat
Less than a day after Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine, the head of security at Meta (formerly Facebook) announced the company would no longer accept ad money from Russian state media outlets like Russia Today and Sputnik. Twitter said it would pause all ads from both Russia and Ukraine. And the next day, Feb. 26, YouTube quietly shared that it had begun blocking a handful of Kremlin-run media outlets from monetizing and running ads on their channels too.
It was the start of a cascade of corporate denials of service: one after the other, prominent social media and tech companies intensified restrictions on Russian state media’s presence on their platforms.
Together, the moves to take down Russian state content, which ultimately led to RT shutting down its American operations entirely, highlight that tech companies play a crucial role in deciding what information gets disseminated in times of crisis and which narratives can gain traction. But without real regulations and without companies crafting and consistently following policies of their own, we can only expect more confusion.
Meta Changes Stance on Violent Posts in Ukraine as Russia Bans Instagram
Meta Platforms said this weekend that it will narrow a content moderation policy for Ukraine that temporarily allowed users to call for violence against Russian soldiers or the death of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The decision came as Russia moved to ban Instagram from the country over the issue.
“We are now narrowing the focus to make it explicitly clear in the guidance that it is never to be interpreted as condoning violence against Russians in general,” Meta announced in an internal company post on Sunday, according to Reuters. “We also do not permit calls to assassinate a head of state.”
The company’s latest decision comes after it initially announced on Thursday that users could call for violence against Russians within the context of war. Meta also temporarily allowed users in Russia, Ukraine, Poland and other eastern European countries to post calls for the death of Putin or Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko.
Exclusive: Ukraine Has Started Using Clearview AI’s Facial Recognition During War
Ukraine’s defense ministry on Saturday began using Clearview AI’s facial recognition technology, the company’s chief executive told Reuters, after the U.S. startup offered to uncover Russian assailants, combat misinformation and identify the dead.
Ukraine is receiving free access to Clearview AI’s powerful search engine for faces, letting authorities potentially vet people of interest at checkpoints, among other uses, added Lee Wolosky, an adviser to Clearview and former diplomat under U.S. presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden.
The plans started forming after Russia invaded Ukraine and Clearview Chief Executive Hoan Ton-That sent a letter to Kyiv offering assistance, according to a copy seen by Reuters.
The Clearview founder said his startup had more than 2 billion images from the Russian social media service VKontakte at its disposal, out of a database of over 10 billion photos total.
Google ‘Hijacked Millions of Customers and Orders’ From Restaurants, Lawsuit Says
Google is being sued by a Florida restaurant group alleging that the tech company has been setting up unauthorized pages to capture food orders rather than directing them to the restaurant’s own site.
Google uses “bait-and-switch” tactics to get customers to place takeout or pickup orders through “new, unauthorized, and deceptively branded webpages,” according to the lawsuit, filed on behalf of Left Field Holdings, a restaurant company that runs Lime Fresh Mexican Grill franchises. On those pages, customers are prompted with large buttons to order with food delivery companies like GrubHub, DoorDash, or Seamless.
“Google never bothered to obtain permission from the restaurants to sell their products online,” the lawsuit says. “Google purposefully designed its websites to appear to the user to be offered, sponsored, and approved by the restaurant, when they are not — a tactic, no doubt, employed by Google to increase orders and clicks.”
A U.S. Surveillance Program Tracks Nearly 200,000 Immigrants. What Happens to Their Data?
The Biden administration is proposing to expand a controversial surveillance program that tracks the whereabouts of more than 180,000 immigrants awaiting their day in court. But there is little transparency about what data is collected by the private company with an exclusive contract to run the program, or what may happen to that data in the future.
In a letter to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), U.S. lawmakers on Feb. 23 raised fresh concerns about the Intensive Supervision Appearance Program, and the data collection practices of BI Inc, the private company running the effort for U.S. Immigration and Custom Enforcement (Ice).
Without sweeping federal laws regulating consumer data, there are few mechanisms to compel BI to share much beyond the basics and even fewer to limit its ability to collect, store and share personal data as it wishes.
