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Facebook's Zuckerberg denies selling people's data

Agencies
January 25, 2019

San Francisco, Jan 25: Facebook co-founder and chief Mark Zuckerberg on Thursday renewed his defense of the social network's business, arguing that targeting ads based on interests was different from selling people's data.

"If we're committed to serving everyone, then we need a service that is affordable to everyone," Zuckerberg said in an opinion piece published in the Wall Street Journal.

"The best way to do that is to offer services for free, which ads enable us to do."

2018 was a horrific year for Facebook, marked by a series of scandals over data protection and privacy and concerns that the leading social network had been manipulated by foreign interests for political purposes.

Despite the scandals, Facebook revenue and user numbers have continued to grow.

Making ads relevant, and less annoying, involves understanding people's interests, according to Zuckerberg.

Facebook uses "signals" such as pages users "like" and what they share about themselves to target advertising.

"Sometimes this means people assume we do things that we don't do," Zuckerberg said of the business of supporting the social network with targeted ads.

"For example, we don't sell people's data, even though it's often reported that we do."

Selling user data would not only undermine essential trust in the social network, it would go against Facebook's business interests because rivals could use it to compete for advertising, he reasoned.

Facebook also provides users with controls regarding information used for ad targeting and lets them block advertisers, Zuckerberg pointed out.

Criticism of Facebook has included the social network being used as a platform to spread divisive or misleading information, as was the case during the 2016 election that put US President Donald Trump in the White House.

"Clickbait and other junk may drive engagement in the near term, but it would be foolish for us to show this intentionally, because it's not what people want," Zuckerberg wrote.

"Another question is whether we leave harmful or divisive content up because it drives engagement. We don't."

Facebook has been investing in artificial intelligence and adding employees devoted to ferreting out content that violates the social network's rules.

The expense could weigh on its quarterly earnings, due for release next week.

"The only reason bad content remains is because the people and artificial-intelligence systems we use to review it are not perfect -- not because we have an incentive to ignore it," he said.

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News Network
January 27,2020

Jehanabad, Jan 27: The police here carried out a raid at the ancestral house of anti-CAA activist Sharjeel Imam, who has been slapped with a sedition case in the national capital for alleged inflammatory speeches he gave at Shaheen Bagh and the Jamia Milia Islamia, a senior official said on Monday.

According to Superintendent of Police, Jehanabad, Manish Kumar, Imams house in Kako police station area was raided late on Sunday night following "help sought by central agencies" which are investigating the cases lodged against the JNU research scholar.

Imam was not found at his house but two of his relatives and their driver were detained for interrogation and let off thereafter, the SP said.

A graduate in computer science from IIT-Mumbai, Sharjeel Imam had shifted to Delhi for pursuing research at the Centre for Historical Studies, JNU.

He was slapped with a sedition case after his alleged speeches went viral on the social media wherein he was heard speaking about Assam's possible secession from the country in the wake of the Citienship (Amendment) Act (CAA).

Earlier, he had been booked on similar charges at a police station in Aligarh for a speech he delivered on the AMU campus.

Besides, a case under the stringent anti-terror law UAPA has been registered against him at Assam.

Imams late father Akbar Imam was a local JD(U) leader who had unsuccessfully contested an assembly election in his lifetime.

Reacting to the developments, his distraught mother Afshan Rahim told the media, "My son is innocent. He is a bright young man and not a thief or a pickpocket. I swear in the name of God that I do not know about his whereabouts. But I can guarantee that upon learning about the cases, he will appear before the investigating agencies and fully cooperate in the probe."

She said that it has been a long time since she met her son though she had a telephonic conversation with him a few weeks ago.

"He was obviously disturbed by the CAA and fears of the National Register of Citiznes (NRC) about being implemented across the country which, he said, would affect not just Muslims but all poor people," she said.

In fact, after 15 days of Shaheen Bagh protest, he had asked the agitators there to withdraw and watch the situation for a month, and then decide on the further course of action, she said. "But they refused to relent. He was calling for a 'chakkajam' (road blockade). He is just a kid and not capable of instigating people for secession," she added.

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News Network
March 18,2020

Dubai, Mar 18: Emirates, one of the world's biggest international airlines, has asked pilots to take unpaid leave to help it mitigate the impact of the coronavirus pandemic that has shattered demand for global travel.

"To this end you are strongly encouraged to make use of this opportunity to volunteer for additional paid and unpaid leave," the airline said in an internal email to pilots, seen by Reuters.

Emirates earlier this month asked some staff to take unpaid leave, although at that time it was not available to pilots.

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Agencies
July 28,2020

Sydney, Jul 28: Nearly 3 billion koalas, kangaroos and other native Australian animals were killed or displaced by bushfires in 2019 and 2020, a study by the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) said on Tuesday, triple the group's earlier estimates.

Some 143 million mammals, 2.46 billion reptiles, 180 million birds and 51 million frogs were impacted by the country's worst bushfires in decades, the WWF said.

When the fires were still blazing, the WWF estimated the number of affected animals at 1.25 billion. The fires destroyed more than 11 million hectares (37 million acres) across the Australian southeast, equal to about half the area of the United Kingdom.

"This ranks as one of the worst wildlife disasters in modern history," said WWF-Australia Chief Executive Officer Dermot O'Gorman in a statement.

The project leader Lily Van Eeden, from the University of Sydney, said the research was the first continent-wide analysis of animals impacted by the bushfires, and "other nations can build upon this research to improve understanding of bushfire impacts everywhere".

The total number included animals which were displaced because of destroyed habitats and now faced lack of food and shelter or the prospect of moving to habitat that was already occupied.

The main reason for raising the number of animal casualties was that researchers had now assessed the total affected area, rather than focusing on the most affected states, they said.

After years of drought made the Australian bush unusually dry, the country battled one of its worst bushfire seasons ever from September 2019 to March 2020, resulting in 34 human deaths and nearly 3,000 homes lost.

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