Internet News

It is not only the British parliament that is clamouring to control their subjects via an identity verification requirement fo social media users. Governments are=round the world are doubling their efforts to end online anonymity by proposing and introducing new laws that force users to hand over their identity documents (IDs) to use social media and by framing online anonymity as something that needs to be eradicated.

While most of these government efforts to end online anonymity have been widely covered in the media, America's recent proposals have managed to stay out of the spotlight. But despite flying under the radar, these proposals do exist in a discussion draft that was introduced by Congressman John Curtis in May.

The discussion draft aims to require a provider of a social media service to verify the identity of users of the service, and for other purposes and prevent anyone from creating a social media account without verifying their identity.

Not only does this discussion draft intend to make ID verification mandatory for anyone who wants to create a social media account but it also wants to force social media companies to report users to the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) whenever they suspect users have submitted fake IDs. Additionally, it contains a requirement for the FTC to submit these reports to the United States (US) Department of Justice (DOJ).

While the discussion draft does include an exception for social media providers that have annual revenues of less than $1 billion for three consecutive years, the large social media platforms where the vast majority of the more than three billion total social media users are registered will be forced to verify the real identity of their users.

The government has decided to counter terrorist knife murders by censoring the internet and taking away everyone's rights to (justifiably) insult their knee jerking MPs.

Writing in the Daily Mail, Nadine Dorries, Secretary of State for Digital Censorship Culture, Media and Sport said:

Online hate has poisoned public life, it's intolerable, it's often unbearable and it has to end.

Enough is enough. Social media companies have no excuses. And once this bill passes through Parliament, they will have no choice.

She also said the government had decided to re-examine how our legislation can go even further to ensure the biggest social media companies properly protect users from anonymous abuse.

Twitter is not impressed and has aired its concerns that the bill gives too much influence to the culture secretary over Ofcom.

The current draft bill would allow Dorries to change the Ofcom code of practice that would be used to regulate the likes of Facebook and Twitter.

Speaking to Radio 4's Westminster Hour programme, Katy Minshall,  the head of policy in the UK for Twitter, said the bill gave the minister unusual powers, leaving Ofcom to muddle through.

She also rejected the idea of stronger rules around online anonymity -- something some MPs have campaigned for. Minshall argued that clamping down on anonymous accounts would fail to deal with the problems of online abuse and could damage people who rely on pseudonymity. She said:

If you're a young person exploring their sexuality or you're a victim of domestic violence looking online for help and for support, pseudonymity is a really important safety tool for you.

She added that users already had to provide a date of birth, full name and email address when signing up, meaning that the police could access data about an account, even if someone had used a pseudonym.

Minshall said the bill had thrown up all sorts of really important questions, such as how do we define legal but harmful content and what sorts of exemptions should we make for journalistic content or content of democratic importance.

Instagram has started showing some users a popup message explaining that it will soon take away their ability to post links stickers, which many creators use to send their followers to other sites, digital stores, and platforms where they can make money.

Instagram doesn't allow adult content on its platform, but many adult content creators use it for promotional reasons, inviting their Instagram audience to follow them to other platforms or personal sites.

Link stickers are an option where users can add an external link to their photo or video. In August, Instagram removed the ability to link and send users off platform by swipe-up on a story and replaced it with a sticker, a small clickable icon that hovers over the image.

The Instagram popup warns:

Starting October 25, you will no longer have access to the link sticker because you have shared content that violates our Community Guidelines, the message said. There is no option to appeal this decision, only an OK button and a link to the Community Guidelines. Screenshot of the Instagram notification.

An Instagram spokesperson told Motherboard in a statement:

As part of our efforts to limit the spread of harmful content that violates our Community Guidelines, we'll restrict people who have repeatedly or severely violated these policies from using the link sticker. However, we're investigating an issue where people may have mistakenly been notified that they will be restricted, and we're working on resolving this as soon as possible.

The city of Vienna is taking an offbeat approach to the social media censorship of art and has turned to using the adults-only online platform OnlyFans to put its most explicit artworks on full display.

The tourism board for the Austrian capital is now presenting art from four of Vienna's most revered museums, including the Albertina Museum and the Leopold Museum, on the adults-only platform in response to the blocking of some artistic content containing nudity on social media.

In July, the Albertina Museum's TikTok account was suspended -- and later blocked -- for displaying works by the Japanese artist and photographer Nobuyoshi Araki that showed a partially-obscured breast. Back in 2019, Instagram said that a painting by the legendary Flemish artist Peter Paul Rubens violated its community guidelines. Earlier this year, when the Leopold Museum marked its 20th anniversary, a video uploaded to Facebook and Instagram which contained work by Koloman Moser was rejected because it was flagged as potentially pornographic by the platforms.

Now, these works and more of Vienna's 18+ content can be found on full, unfiltered display on OnlyFans -- a subscription-based website best known as a platform for sharing and viewing pornographic content.

Squid Game is a 2021 South Korea action mystery thriller
Starring Edward Hong, Yuuki Luna and Daniel C Kennedy

Hundreds of cash-strapped players accept a strange invitation to compete in children's games. Inside, a tempting prize awaits with deadly high stakes...

A few schools have urged parents to stop their kids watching Netflix's Squid Game. The Netflix show has been a huge hit but schools are reportedly concerned about copycat actions. Youngsters are believed to be wanting to re-enact the games in school playgrounds.

According to the Mirror, one dad said his children's school in Ilford, east London, warned parents in a letter about kids playing their own version of Squid Game and that parents could be sanctioned over it.

One school in Belgium also raised concerns over kids mimicking the show's outcome - with children beating up eliminated players.

Sandown School in Deal, Kent, issued extra lessons on violence and online harm as a response to the show's popularity. According to the Mirror, a spokeswoman for the school said Key Stage 2 teachers gave their pupils extra lessons on online safety and the dangers of watching content that is not age appropriate.

Goodwin Academy, another school in Deal, reportedly confirmed its safeguarding team sent a letter to parents regarding age concerns over the content in the series.

Squid Game has been rated appropriate for viewers aged 15 and older and Netflix gives a series of content warnings including sex, violence and suicide.

 

Update: Bedfordshire Council recommends Squid Games

18th October 2021. See article from theguardian.com

Central Bedfordshire Council  has advised parents not to let their children watch the Netflix show Squid Game, after reports children as young as six are copying its violent challenges.

The education safeguarding team from Central Bedfordshire council sent an email to parents and guardians in the district urging them to be vigilant after hearing reports that children and young people are copying games and violence from hit new Netflix series Squid Game, which is rated 15. The team wrote:

There have been some concerning reports recently about children and young people 'playing' Squid Game whilst at school. Squid Game is also being viewed via other platforms such as YouTube and TikTok, and given the popularity of the games in the show, developers have made various mini-games based on Squid Game on Roblox and other gaming platforms.

We strongly advise that children should not watch Squid Game. The show is quite graphic with a lot of violent content.

Update: Viewers heed the recommendations

18th October 2021. See article from inews.co.uk

Netflix has said that the violent Korean drama Squid Game is now its most successful TV show of all time.

The streaming giant told shareholders on Wednesday that the drama has been watched by a mind-boggling 142 million households around the world, though Netflix's definition of viewers includes people who only watched a small portion of a single episode of a TV show.

Microsoft has decided to pull social networking facilities from the Chinese version of LinkedIn business networking app. LinkedIn explains in a blog post:

Our decision to launch a localized version of LinkedIn in China in February 2014 was driven by our mission to connect the world's professionals to make them more productive and successful. We recognized that operating a localized version of LinkedIn in China would mean adherence to requirements of the Chinese government on Internet platforms. While we strongly support freedom of expression, we took this approach in order to create value for our members in China and around the world. We also established a clear set of guidelines to follow should we ever need to re-evaluate our localized version of LinkedIn in China.

This strategy has enabled us to navigate the operation of our localized version of LinkedIn in China over the past seven years to help our members in China find a job, share and stay informed. While we've found success in helping Chinese members find jobs and economic opportunity, we have not found that same level of success in the more social aspects of sharing and staying informed. We're also facing a significantly more challenging operating environment and greater compliance requirements in China. Given this, we've made the decision to sunset the current localized version of LinkedIn, which is how people in China access LinkedIn's global social media platform, later this year.

Our new strategy for China is to put our focus on helping China-based professionals find jobs in China and Chinese companies find quality candidates. Later this year, we will launch InJobs, a new, standalone jobs application for China. InJobs will not include a social feed or the ability to share posts or articles. We will also continue to work with Chinese businesses to help them create economic opportunity.

This decision aligns with our commitment to creating economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. While that has been our vision for nearly two decades now, it feels more important than ever as we all strive to build a global economy that delivers more prosperity and progress to people all over the world.

A French court on Friday, has rejected a claim brought by two children's campaigns calling for the blocking of major porn websites in France.

The judge rejected the claim because the court facing time pressures had not been able to hear arguments from the sites' publishers.

The anti-porn campaigners had hoped for the blocking of nine top porn sites, including PornHub and Xvideos.

One of the ISPs being asked to censor the porn, Orange, noted that it already offered tools such as parental controls to limit children's access to online pornography.

Samuel Comblez of e-Enfance, one of the children's campaigners, said: It's not a completely lost battle, adding that it was now examining other ways to restrict access to the sites.

The UK Ministry of defence has published a wide ranging paper about better ways for it to catalogue and analyse data from multiple sources, mostly for military purposes.

The document contains a brief section speaking of a capability to monitor social media with a view to analysing changes in political sentiment:

The below present example scenarios for Defence to drive battlespace advantage and business efficiency through exploiting its data in a multi-domain and integrated environment.

Political demonstration:

• Sensors: Automated scanning of social media platforms (analysing key words and interactions) detects change in population sentiment.

• Decision makers: Local authorities are quickly informed of change in sentiment. Decision making is enhanced by local surveillance of groups of interest.

• Effectors: Escalated monitoring and intelligence gathering, with heightened readiness measures to respond in place.

Surely an incredibly short paragraph to describe such an enormous capability for state snooping.

Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp were offline for several hours on October 4th, 2021.

Starting at about 12pm Eastern Time, Pornhub's traffic increased by as much as +10.5%, which equals about half a million additional users during each hour that Facebook's services were down.

Pornhub's statisticians found similar traffic increases during another Facebook & Instagram Outage in March of 2019.