FB removes 3 bn fake accounts, says 5% of its monthly active users were fake

Agencies
May 24, 2019

San Francisco, May 24: Facebook has removed more than three billion fake accounts in the October 2018-March 2019 period, saying that about 5 per cent of its monthly active users were fake.

Facebook disabled 1.2 billion accounts in Q4 2018 and 2.19 billion in Q1 2019.

"For fake accounts, the amount of accounts we took action on increased due to automated attacks by bad actors who attempt to create large volumes of accounts at one time," Guy Rosen, Facebook's vice president for integrity, said in a blog post on Thursday.

According to Rosen, for every 10,000 times people who view content on Facebook, 11 to 14 views contained content that violate the platform's adult nudity and sexual activity policy.

"We estimated for every 10,000 times people viewed content on Facebook, 25 views contained content that violated our violence and graphic content policy.

"During the second half of 2018, the volume of content restrictions based on local law increased globally by 135 per cent from 15,337 to 35,972.

"This increase was primarily driven by 16,600 items we restricted in India based on a Delhi High Court order regarding claims made about PepsiCo products," said Facebook.

In the second half of 2018, Facebook identified 53 disruptions of Facebook services in nine countries, compared to 48 disruptions in eight nations in the first half of 2018.

"This half, India accounted for 85 per cent of total new global disruptions," said the company.

In this period, on Facebook and Instagram, the company took down 2,595,410 pieces of content based on 511,706 copyright reports; 215,877 pieces of content based on 81,243 trademark reports; and 781,875 pieces of content based on 62,829 counterfeit reports.

"In Q1 2019, we took action on about 900,000 pieces of drug sale content, of which 83.3 per cent we detected pro-actively. In the same period, we took action on about 670,000 pieces of firearm sale content, of which 69.9 per cent we detected pro-actively," added Rosen.

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Agencies
January 4,2020

Washington D.C: One of the greatest spectacles of modern art is still thriving in the Australian outback as confirmed by satellite imagery of NASA. The Marree Man is a massive geoglyph depicting an aboriginal hunter, that spans over 2.6 miles in the Southern Australian region.

Discovered by a pilot in 1998, its origin still remains a mystery even to this date.

The Marree Man was given a new lease of life in 2016 when a group of people from the neighboring town of Marree plowed its lines to avert its fading due to erosion.

After NASA shared the image of the art-work that was taken in June, the efforts of the good samaritans turned out to be a total success, reported CNN Travel.

The restoration team believes that the refurbished Marree Man would last longer than its original version.

According to NASA, "They [the team] created wind grooves, designed to trap water and encourage the growth of vegetation. They hope that eventually, the man will turn green."

In a previous article, CNN reported that an entrepreneur by the name of Dick Smith took upon himself to unravel the geoglyph's mystery in 2016. His team combed through all the available evidence but couldn't find anything conclusive.

In 2018 he even offered a 5,000 Australian dollar reward for anyone who knows the identity of its creator.

Nobody turned up with an answer but it was speculated that unknown artist lives in Alice Springs or even might be an American.

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Agencies
March 15,2020

Cybercriminals continue to exploit public fear of rising coronavirus cases through malware and phishing emails in the guise of content coming from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in the US and World Health Organisation (WHO), says cybersecurity firm Kaspersky.

In the APAC region, Kaspersky has detected 93 coronavirus-related malware in Bangladesh, 53 in the Philippines, 40 in China, 23 in Vietnam, 22 in India and 20 in Malaysia. 

Single-digit detections were monitored in Singapore, Japan, Indonesia, Hong Kong, Myanmar, and Thailand. 

Along with the consistent increase of 2019 coronavirus cases comes the incessant techniques cybercriminals are using to prey on public panic amidst the global epidemic, the company said in a statement. 

Kaspersky also detected emails offering products such as masks, and then the topic became more commonly used in Nigerian spam emails. Researchers also found scam emails with phishing links and malicious attachments.

One of the latest spam campaigns mimics the World Health Organisation (WHO), showing how cybercriminals recognise and are capitalising on the important role WHO has in providing trustworthy information about the coronavirus.

"We would encourage companies to be particularly vigilant at this time, and ensure employees who are working at home exercise caution. 

"Businesses should communicate clearly with workers to ensure they are aware of the risks, and do everything they can to secure remote access for those self-isolating or working from home," commented David Emm, principal security researcher.

Some malicious files are spread via email. 

For example, an Excel file distributed via email under the guise of a list of coronavirus victims allegedly sent from the World Health Organisation (WHO) was, in fact, a Trojan-Downloader, which secretly downloads and installs another malicious file. 

This second file was a Trojan-Spy designed to gather various data, including passwords, from the infected device and send it to the attacker.

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Agencies
July 10,2020

In a first, the Supreme Court on Friday allowed the service of summons and notices, a necessity in almost all legal proceedings, through instant messenger like WhatsApp as well as by e-mail and fax.

A bench headed by Chief Justice SA Bobde observed that it has been brought to the notice of the court that it is not feasible to visit post offices for service of notices, summons, and pleadings. The bench also comprising Justices AS Bopanna and R Subhash Reddy observed that notice and summons should be sent through e-mail on the same day along with instant message through WhatsApp and other phone messenger services.

The bench clarified that all methods should be deployed for a valid service on the party. "Two blue ticks would convey that the receiver has seen the notice," noted the bench.

The bench declined the request of the Attorney General for specifically naming WhatsApp as a mode of effectuating service. The top court noted that it would not be practical to specify only WhatsApp. The apex court also permitted RBI to extend the validity of cheques in the backdrop of lockdown to contain the coronavirus outbreak.

Senior advocate V Giri representing RBI informed the bench that he had circulated the note regarding validity of a cheque as directions issued on the previous hearing.

The bench noted that it will be in discretion of the RBI to issue orders which are suitable to alter the validity of the period of a cheque.

During an earlier hearing on the matter on July 7, the Attorney General contended before the top court that the Centre had some reservations in connection with the utilization of mobile applications like WhatsApp and other apps for service of summons. The Centre's top law officer informed the apex court that these apps claimed to be encrypted, and they were not trustworthy.

The RBI counsel had contended before the top court that it was considering clarifying the validity of a cheque which has been reduced to 3 months from 6 months.

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