Key U.S. lawmakers pilloried social media giant Facebook on Tuesday after Frances Haugen, an inside whistleblower who once worked at the company, alleged that Facebook’s products are harming young people, undermining democracy and helping to divide the country politically. 

Haugen, who worked as a Facebook project manager for less than two years, held Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg responsible for prioritizing concerns about company profits over controlling online content on its various platforms, including Instagram. 

Haugen testified before the Senate Commerce Subcommittee on Consumer Protection a day after Facebook had encountered hourslong technical issues that left millions of users wondering why they could not access the site and its other platforms such as Instagram and WhatsApp. 

“I don’t know why it went down,” Haugen said, “but I know that for more than five hours, Facebook wasn’t used to deepen divides, destabilize democracies, and make young girls and women feel bad about their bodies” with the posting of glamorous pictures of models, pop singers and Hollywood starlets. 

Democratic and Republican lawmakers, in a rare show of political unanimity in Washington, quickly castigated Facebook and panned Zuckerberg for a recent sailing trip while controversy engulfed his company. They promised to enact tighter controls on social media. 

Democratic Senator Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut contended, “The damage to self-interest and self-worth inflicted by Facebook today will haunt a generation. Our children are the ones who are victims. Teens today looking in the mirror feel doubt and insecurity. Mark Zuckerberg ought to be looking at himself in the mirror.” 

He said, “Big Tech now faces the Big Tobacco jaw-dropping moment of truth.” 

Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee declared that Facebook “is not interested in making significant changes to improve kids’ safety on their platforms, at least not when that would result in losing eyeballs on posts or decreasing their ad revenues.” 

“It is clear that Facebook prioritizes profit over the well-being of children and all users,” she said. 

Other lawmakers accused Facebook of helping to foment the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol, when hundreds of supporters of former President Donald Trump stormed into the building to try to prevent lawmakers from declaring that Democrat Joe Biden had won last November’s election. 

Democratic Senator Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota said, “When they allowed 99% of violent content to remain unchecked on their platform, including the lead-up to the January 6 insurrection, what did they do? Now we know Mark Zuckerberg was going sailing.” 

While the hearing was ongoing, Facebook pushed back against Haugen and the onslaught of criticism. It said in a statement that Haugen had no other Facebook employees who reported to her, had never attended a decision-making meeting with top Facebook officials, and had acknowledged in her testimony at least six times she was being asked questions about aspects of the company she had not worked on. 

“We don’t agree with her characterization of the many issues she testified about,” Facebook said. 

“Despite all this,” Facebook said, “we agree on one thing; it’s time to begin to create standard rules for the internet. It’s been 25 years since the rules for the internet have been updated, and instead of expecting the industry to make societal decisions that belong to legislators, it is time for Congress to act.”

Haugen acknowledged that she was the one who provided the documents used in a Wall Street Journal investigation of Facebook. 

Some information for this report came from Reuters. 

 
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Facebook took another pounding in the U.S. Congress on Tuesday and a senator called on federal regulators to investigate accusations by a whistleblower that the company pushed for higher profits while being cavalier about user safety.

In an opening statement to a Senate Commerce subcommittee, chair Senator Richard Blumenthal, a Democrat, said that Facebook knew that its products were addictive, like cigarettes. “Tech now faces that big tobacco jawdropping moment of truth,” he said.

He called for Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to testify before the committee, and for the Securities and Exchange Commission and Federal Trade Commission to investigate the social media company.

“Our children are the ones who are victims. Teens today looking in the mirror feel doubt and insecurity. Mark Zuckerberg ought to be looking at himself in the mirror,” Blumenthal said, adding that Zuckerberg instead was going sailing.

In an era when bipartisanship is rare on Capitol Hill, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle agreed on the need for big changes at Facebook.

The top Republican on the subcommittee, Marsha Blackburn, said that Facebook turned a blind eye to children below age 13 on its sites. “It is clear that Facebook prioritizes profit over the well-being of children and all users.”

Facebook spokesman Kevin McAlister said in an email ahead of the hearing that the company sees protecting its community as more important than maximizing profits and said it was not accurate that leaked internal research demonstrated that Instagram was “toxic” for teenage girls.

Frances Haugen, a former product manager on Facebook’s civic misinformation team, said the company keeps its algorithms and operations a secret.

“The core of the issue is that no one can understand Facebook’s destructive choices better than Facebook, because only Facebook gets to look under the hood,” she said in written testimony prepared for the hearing.

“A critical starting point for effective regulation is transparency,” she said in testimony to be delivered to the subcommittee. “On this foundation, we can build sensible rules and standards to address consumer harms, illegal content, data protection, anticompetitive practices, algorithmic systems and more.”

Haugen revealed she was the one who provided documents used in a Wall Street Journal investigation and a Senate hearing on Instagram’s harm to teenage girls.

The Journal’s stories showed the company contributed to increased polarization online when it made changes to its content algorithm; failed to take steps to reduce vaccine hesitancy; and was aware that Instagram harmed the mental health of teenage girls.

Haugen said Facebook had also done too little to prevent its site from being used by people planning violence.

Facebook was used by people planning mass killings in Myanmar and the Jan. 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol by supporters of then-President Donald Trump who were determined to toss out the 2020 election results.
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An outage has left millions of people around the world unable to use Facebook along with its Instagram and WhatsApp platforms to connect with friends, family and others.

“We’re aware that some people are having trouble accessing our apps and products. We’re working to get things back to normal as quickly as possible, and we apologize for any inconvenience,” the company tweeted Monday.

The outage appears to have started around 11:45 a.m. Eastern time.

Recently, The Wall Street Journal reported that internal Facebook documents showed the company knows about the negative effects of its products yet does little to counter potentially harmful consequences. CBS’s “60 Minutes” program Sunday broadcast an interview with a whistleblower, Frances Haugen, who aired her grievances about the social media giant.

Haugen is expected to testify before a Senate subcommittee on Tuesday.
Facebook says her allegations are misleading.
 
Some information in this report comes from The Associated Press.
…

The whistleblower who shared a trove of Facebook documents alleging the social media giant knew its products were fueling hate and harming children’s mental health revealed her identity Sunday in a televised interview, and accused the company of choosing “profit over safety.” 

Frances Haugen, a 37-year-old data scientist from Iowa, has worked for companies including Google and Pinterest, but said in an interview with CBS news show “60 Minutes” that Facebook was “substantially worse” than anything she had seen before.  

She called for the company to be regulated. 

“Facebook over and over again has shown it chooses profit over safety. It is subsidizing, it is paying for its profits with our safety,” Haugen said. 

“The version of Facebook that exists today is tearing our societies apart and causing ethnic violence around the world,” she added. 

The world’s largest social media platform has been embroiled in a firestorm brought about by Haugen, who as an unnamed whistleblower shared the documents with U.S. lawmakers and The Wall Street Journal that detail how Facebook knew its products, including Instagram, were harming young girls. 

In the “60 Minutes” interview she explained how the algorithm, which picks what to show in a user’s news feed, is optimized for content that gets a reaction. 

The company’s own research shows that it is “easier to inspire people to anger than it is to other emotions,” Haugen said. 

“Facebook has realized that if they change the algorithm to be safer, people will spend less time on the site, they’ll click on less ads, they’ll make less money,” she said. 

During the 2020 U.S. presidential election, she said, the company realized the danger that such content presented and turned on safety systems to reduce it.  

But “as soon as the election was over, they turn them back off, or they change the settings back to what they were before, to prioritize growth over safety, and that really feels like a betrayal of democracy to me,” she said.  

“No one at Facebook is malevolent,” she said, adding that the incentives are “misaligned.” 

“Facebook makes more money when you consume more content. … And the more anger that they get exposed to, the more they interact, the more they consume,” she said. 

Haugen did not draw a straight line between that decision to roll back safety systems and U.S. Capitol riot on January 6, though “60 Minutes” noted that the social network was used by some of the organizers of that violence.  

‘Ludicrous’ 

Earlier Sunday, Facebook dismissed as ludicrous suggestions it contributed to the January 6 riot.  

Facebook’s vice president of policy and global affairs Nick Clegg also vehemently pushed back at the assertion its platforms are toxic for teens, days after a tense congressional hearing in which U.S. lawmakers grilled the company over its impact on the mental health of young users. 

The New York Times reported Saturday that Clegg sought to preempt Haugen’s interview by penning a 1,500-word memo to staff alerting them of the “misleading” accusations. 

Clegg pressed the case in an appearance on CNN. 

“I think the assertion (that) January 6th can be explained because of social media, I just think that’s ludicrous,” Clegg told the broadcaster, saying it was “false comfort” to believe technology was driving America’s deepening political polarization. 

The responsibility for the insurrection “lies squarely with the people who inflicted the violence and those who encouraged them, including then-president Trump” and others who asserted the election was stolen, he added. 

Polarization 

While everyone “has a rogue uncle” or old classmate whose extreme views may be visible on Facebook, Clegg reportedly wrote in his memo, “changes to algorithmic ranking systems on one social media platform cannot explain wider societal polarization.” 

Facebook has encountered criticism that it fuels societal problems, attacks Clegg said should not rest at Facebook’s feet. But he acknowledged that some people may not benefit from social media use. 

“I don’t think it’s intuitively surprising if you’re not feeling great about yourself already, that then going on to social media can actually make you feel a bit worse,” he told CNN. 

He also disputed reporting in a Wall Street Journal series that Facebook’s own research warned of the harm that photo-sharing app Instagram can do to teen girls’ well-being. 

“It’s simply not borne out by our research or anybody else’s that Instagram is bad or toxic for all teens,” Clegg said, but added Facebook’s research will continue. 
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Twitter has appealed a French court decision that ordered it to give activists full access to all of its relevant documents on efforts to fight hate speech, lawyers and a judicial source said on Saturday.

In July, a French court ordered Twitter to grant six French anti-discrimination groups full access to all documents relating to the company’s efforts to combat hate speech since May 2020. The ruling applied to Twitter’s global operation, not just France.

Twitter has appealed the decision and a hearing has been set for December 9, 2021, a judicial source told AFP, confirming information released by the groups’ lawyers.

Twitter and its lawyers declined to comment.

The July order said that Twitter must hand over “all administrative, contractual, technical or commercial documents” detailing the resources it has assigned to fight homophobic, racist and sexist discourse on the site, as well as the offense of “condoning crimes against humanity”.

It also said Twitter must reveal how many moderators it employs in France to examine posts flagged as hateful, and data on the posts they process.

The July ruling gave the San Francisco-based company two months to comply. Twitter can ask for a suspension pending the appeal.

The six anti-discrimination groups had taken Twitter to court in France last year, accusing the US social media giant of “long-term and persistent” failures in blocking hateful comments from the site.  

The groups campaign against homophobia, racism and anti-Semitism.

Twitter’s hateful conduct policy bans users from promoting violence or threatening or attacking people based on their race, religion, gender identity or disability, among other forms of discrimination.  

Like other social media giants, it allows users to report posts they believe are hateful, and employs moderators to vet the content.  

But anti-discrimination groups have long complained that holes in the policy allow hateful comments to stay online in many cases.

 
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Since China’s government declared all cryptocurrency transactions illegal last week and banned citizens from working for crypto-related companies, the price of bitcoin went up despite being shut out of one of its biggest markets.

Experts say large-scale Chinese miners of cryptocurrency — the likes of Bitcoin and Ethereum — will take their high-powered, electricity-guzzling servers offshore. Exchanges of the digital money and the numerous Chinese startups linked to the trade also are expected to rebase offshore after dropping domestic customers from their rosters.

The shift highlights how virtual currencies can evade government regulation.

“The exchanges have been pushing offshore anyways, and with the exchange business you need cloud infrastructure, you need developers, you need management to move things in the right direction, and so whether that is sitting in Taipei, San Francisco, Singapore or Shanghai, it doesn’t really matter — those businesses are very virtual,” said Zennon Kapron, Singapore-based founder the financial consulting firm Kapronasia.

“The real impact we’ve probably seen though is in the miners, and most of those miners [are in] the process of shifting overseas or [have] already completed moving overseas,” he said.

Strongest anti-crypto action to date

On Sept. 24, the People’s Bank of China, Beijing’s monetary authority, released a statement saying cryptocurrencies lack the status of other monetary instruments. The notice, issued in tandem with nine other government agencies, including the Bureau of Public Security, declared all related business illegal and warned that cryptocurrency transactions originating outside China will also be treated as crimes.

Explaining the ban, China’s official Xinhua News Agency reported Friday that cryptocurrencies have disrupted the controlled economy’s financial systems and contributed to crimes such as money laundering.

Cryptocurrencies — digital commerce tools that aren’t linked to a centralized banking authority — first appeared in China around 2008. Chinese banks began to prohibit the use of digital currencies in 2013 and stepped up regulations after 2016.

China was the world’s biggest Bitcoin miner and supported the largest exchange by volume, according to the news website CryptoVantage. It says many of those who suddenly made millions when Bitcoin prices soared four years ago were in China.

Chinese miners and traders head to Singapore

The Chinese ban carries penalties for international exchanges that do business with people inside China, and news reports indicate international crypto exchanges are trying to cut ties with Chinese clients in recent days. But the companies themselves are largely staying quiet.

A spokesperson for digital currency exchange Coinbase said Wednesday it does not “have anything to share at this time” about the crackdown in China. U.S.-based Worldcoin Global, a new type of cryptocurrency, did not reply to a request for comment.

China’s growing pressure on crypto over the past few years had prompted stakeholders to leave the country, Kapron said, adding that less than a quarter of the country’s original cryptocurrency peer-to-peer lending startups — small firms that connect individual lenders and borrowers — remain in China.

Mining for digital currency — the process of using computers to enter bitcoins into circulation and verify cryptocurrency transactions in exchange for a payout — should get easier overseas as Chinese exit the market, Kapron said.

Smaller operators, he added, may be able to mine more easily without the competition of giant Chinese operations.

Singapore looms as a prime go-to place for operations that need not be physically onshore. The country had accepted about 300 cryptocurrency license applications as of July. From China, e-commerce giant Alibaba as well as digital financial firms Yillion Group and Hande Group have applied, news reports in Asia say.

Other Asian countries lack the legal welcome mat that Singapore has extended, said Jason Hsu, vice president of the Taiwan Fintech Association industry group.

“Where would that money flow to? I think it’s a question that needs to be answered,” Hsu said. “I think in Asia, Singapore would be a destination for them to go to. Singapore obviously has the clearest regulations and also wants to attract more digital fintech [financial-technology] companies.”

Outside Asia, Amsterdam and Frankfurt are “establishing their footprint as international centers” for financial technology, said Rajiv Biswas, Asia Pacific chief economist with market research firm IHS Markit. Financial technology covers cryptocurrency.

Western Europe ranked this year as the world’s biggest crypto economy in the world with inflows of more than $1 trillion or 25% of all global trade, activity, news and data service Chainalysis says. Europe’s surge follows similarly rapid growth in 2020.

Eventual resurgence for crypto in China?

Authorities in China are targeting crypto now as part of a wider “crackdown on overnight riches” and to “clean out the wild, wild West,” Hsu said, referring to largely unregulated market sectors. The trade will go underground for now, he forecasts, and China will eventually come out with an official digital currency issued through major banks.

Several countries are considering adopting new digital currencies that would allow people to exchange money without an intermediary, such as a bank. Proponents argue these currencies could capture the benefits of cryptocurrencies that make exchanging money easy, but without the price volatility of decentralized digital assets like bitcoin.

Chinese authorities may eventually swing to a more tolerant view of non-state-sanctioned digital currencies, though subject to strict criteria on what’s legal or otherwise, said Song Seng Wun, economist in the private banking unit of Malaysian bank CIMB. Blockchain, the core technology behind the public transaction ledger that makes crypto commerce transparent, could continue to develop in China for other ends, he added. 

 
…

During the three-day World Internet Conference held in Wuzhen, China, this week, the country’s biggest tech tycoons rushed to show their support for Beijing’s “common prosperity” initiative.

Their enthusiasm for the initiative comes amid a yearlong crackdown on the country’s tech industry, where several high-profile companies have faced investigations and fines. Formerly high-flying celebrity CEOs are now keeping a low profile.

Daniel Zhang, CEO at e-commerce giant Alibaba group, said his company’s donation of $15 billion to the initiative over the next five years represented its willingness to help China achieve its goal of prosperity for all.

Zhou Hongyi, billionaire entrepreneur and chairman and CEO of the country’s largest Internet security firm, Qihoo 360, said his company will donate an as yet undisclosed sum to the initiative and step up to help smaller firms thrive.

Stressing the need to develop these enterprises, Zhou said, “Our success depends on our country’s policies. … We must take the initiative to align our development with our national strategies and serve our country with science and technology.”

Lei Jun, CEO of consumer electronics manufacturer Xiaomi, said that technological development must be used to achieve social good and that tech companies should help build a good life for everyone.

Other tech giants, such as technology conglomerate Tencent, online agricultural marketplace Pinduoduo and food delivery platform Meituan, answered Beijing’s call before the Sept. 26-28 gathering, pledging financial support for social causes.

‘Common prosperity’ initiative

During his first eight years in office, Chinese President Xi Jinping occasionally mentioned the term “common prosperity.” Since February, when he declared China had eliminated poverty, “common prosperity” has become one of his favorite themes.

At a meeting of the Communist Party’s Central Committee for Financial and Economic Affairs on Aug. 17, Xi stressed that those who are already rich need to guide and help others achieve prosperity.

“Common prosperity means prosperity for all, not just a few people,” Xi said, according to a meeting note published by China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency. “We can allow some to get rich first, but we must then launch a scientific public policy to make sure every citizen can have their fair share.”

Central to achieving common prosperity is a concept known as the three distributions, first introduced by the Chinese economist Li Yining in the 1990s.

According to the explanation from China’s National Development and Reform Commission, the first distribution of wealth comes through market competition. The second is achieved through the state via taxes, subsidies and social welfare programs. The third distribution taps enterprises and individuals to redistribute their wealth through voluntary donations.

‘Third distribution’

“The target of this round of the common prosperity initiative is the wallet of wealthy domestic entrepreneurs,” said Lu Jun, founder of the influential nongovernmental organization Beijing Yirenping Center, in a phone interview with VOA Mandarin. His NGO focuses on eliminating discrimination and defending the rights of disadvantaged groups.

Wang Hsin-Hsien, a political science professor and chair of the East Asian Studies Institute at National Cheng-Chi University in Taiwan, told VOA Mandarin that businesses are essentially forced to make charity donations under the current system.

“China’s current common prosperity initiative is controlled by the party-state. That means large enterprises must make donations in order to show that they are choosing the right side. So I don’t think these donations will be voluntary,” he told VOA Mandarin via phone.

“This is not the charitable donation we see in Western countries, because eventually the money will be returned to the state for redistribution,” he added.

Meanwhile, analysts say this new wave of donation will not likely help boost China’s civil society.

NGOs under microscope

China has been tightening its grip on NGOs since 2016, demanding they provide specific funding sources and membership information or face being banned.

This year, China announced a new wave of crackdowns targeting NGOs. In May, the Ministry of Civil Affairs started to target “illegal NGOs with measures such as limiting their access to conference venues, publicity resources and manpower,” according to the state-owned news outlet China Daily.

“The moves were part of a sweeping campaign launched last month by the ministry and 21 other central agencies to clamp down on the unregistered NGOs, which have masqueraded as foundations, industrial associations and other nongovernmental groups to rake in money from the public,” China Daily said.

Lu told VOA Mandarin that the NGOs that can survive or get funding will be those that align their goals with the government’s agenda — unlike many NGOs outside China, whose views diverge from those of the government.

“I don’t think this is necessarily good news for NGOs, as I believe the money donated by private companies will go to the government-run or government-affiliated NGOs,” he said of the third distribution.

“Beijing won’t allow companies to donate to independent NGOs freely, let alone the ones they don’t like, such as NGOs working on human rights, labor rights and women’s rights.”  

 
…

A popular Chinese-manufactured phone has a built-in censorship tool that can blacklist search terms on the web, according to research by the Lithuanian government, which is urging owners of the phones to replace them. 

The Lithuanian Ministry of Defense analyzed three popular Chinese-made phones currently sold in Europe: the Xiaomi Mi 10T 5G; the Huawei P40 5G; the OnePlus 8T 5G. It reported finding a censorship tool built into the Xiaomi phone that can block certain search terms, including “Long live Taiwan’s independence,” “Free Tibet,” “Democratic Movement,” and “Voice of America.” 

“It is very, very worrying that there is a built-in censorship tool and of keywords, which filters or could filter your search on the web,” Lithuanian Vice Defense Minister Margiris Abukevicius told VOA.

Xiaomi 

Xiaomi is the most popular smartphone brand in Europe. The Lithuanian researchers said the blacklist function was turned off on the Xiaomi phone sold in Europe, but it can be activated remotely. The list of blocked search terms appears to be continually updated. There were 449 words or phrases on the blacklist in April 2021. By September, that number had tripled to 1,376.

“We clearly saw that all of those key words are politically motivated,” Abukevicius said. “Terms such as Tibet, Taiwan, democracy, U.S., and some companies like yours [Voice of America], are mentioned in that list. And they are adding [words] not only in Chinese, they are also adding words in Latin [script].”

German security services also have begun a technical examination of the Xiaomi phone. 

Xiaomi did not respond to VOA requests for comment. The firm said this week it was engaging an independent expert to assess the findings. 

Huawei 

The Lithuanian researchers found the Huawei P40 5G model collected users’ data — including how long they spent using the apps — and stored it on servers outside the European Union, beyond the jurisdiction of the EU’s strict data laws.

The report said Huawei’s official app store, called AppGallery, directed users to apps containing malware.

“A portion of the mobile applications contained on the application distribution platforms are imitations of the original applications, with malicious functionality or virus infestation; such applications can be downloaded and installed by the user on the mobile phone, thereby jeopardizing the security of the device and the data contained in it,” the report said. 

“Data security risks have also been identified in the Xiaomi device; factory-installed system applications send statistical data on the activity of certain applications installed on the device to servers of the Chinese cloud service provider Tencent, located in Singapore, the USA, the Netherlands, Germany and India,” the researchers wrote. 

In a statement, Huawei told VOA, “Huawei has always adhered to the principle of integrity, abided by the laws and regulations of the countries and regions where it operates. Huawei has a strong cybersecurity record in more than 170 countries and regions and has served over 3 billion users. Data is never processed outside the Huawei device.” 

It added, “Huawei is transparent about the necessary data it collects from customers, which is kept to a minimum and used to enhance personalization and the user’s experience. Huawei makes it clear that these apps are from publicly available sources, so the user isn’t forced to download an app.”

National security 

Lithuania has told government workers to get rid of the Xiaomi and Huawei phones. Abukevicius told VOA that other countries should take note of the research. 

“On the basis of national security, really, we are looking for ways to protect our state institutions and institutions working in national security and give them a chance to only work with trusted suppliers. When it comes to consumers, we are giving recommendations of course, you know, to really avoid using cloud services, avoid using some applications, Chinese-made applications,” Abukevicius said. 

China has yet to comment on the report. Many Western countries, including the United States, have blocked Huawei from the rollout of 5G mobile networks, fearing the company poses a security risk. 

“I think our research is an illustration of how we should go beyond that discussion in the telecommunications sector, that we should think about other sectors,” Abukevicius said. 

Diplomatic tensions 

The report comes against a backdrop of tense relations between Lithuania and China.

Both countries have withdrawn their ambassadors after Lithuania agreed to allow Taiwan to open a de facto embassy there using its own name. China claims Taiwan as its own territory. 

In many countries, Taiwan’s diplomatic missions are named after the capital, Taipei, rather than the island itself. In retaliation, Beijing last month halted rail freight to Lithuania and suspended trading licenses for Lithuanian producers.

The United States has reiterated its support for Lithuania in the face of what Washington called “economic coercion” by China. 

 
…

A popular Chinese-made phone has a built-in censorship tool that can blacklist search terms on the web, according to research by the Lithuanian government. The country is urging owners of the phones to replace them, as Henry Ridgwell reports.
…

A company in suburban Washington, D.C., is using cutting-edge technology to create lifelike video avatars to drop into music and training videos, games and other immersive environments. It’s an entry point to the so-called metaverse, as VOA’s Arzouma Kompaoré discovered while touring Avatar Dimension’s new studio.
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YouTube will ban any video that claims vaccines are ineffective or dangerous, including those that question vaccines for measles and chickenpox, the company announced Wednesday.  

“Specifically, content that falsely alleges that approved vaccines are dangerous and cause chronic health effects, claims that vaccines do not reduce transmission or contraction of disease, or contains misinformation on the substances contained in vaccines will be removed,” the Google-owned company said in a blog post announcing the new enforcement measures.

The company said “vaccines in particular have been a source of fierce debate over the years, despite consistent guidance from health authorities about their effectiveness.”  

“Today, we’re expanding our medical misinformation policies on YouTube with new guidelines on currently administered vaccines that are approved and confirmed to be safe and effective by local health authorities and the WHO.”

The company said it “will continue to allow content about vaccine policies, new vaccine trials and historical vaccine successes or failures.”  

YouTube’s COVID-19 vaccine policy has met with some backlash for being overly aggressive.

On Tuesday, the company removed Russian state-backed broadcaster RT’s German-language channels, saying they violated the company’s COVID-19 policy.

On Wednesday, Russia threatened to block YouTube, calling the channel removals “unprecedented information aggression.”

YouTube said it has removed over 130,000 videos over the past year for violating its COVID-19 policies.

Some information in this report comes from Reuters.

 
…

A bunch of new technologies are popping up that could help bring global energy-related carbon dioxide emissions to net-zero by 2050, and all need investment. Governments worldwide are having to decide which one suits their geography and how much they can spend on a given technology. More with VOA’s Mariama Diallo.

Produced by: Kimberlyn Weeks    
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Facebook is putting its Instagram Kids project on hold amid growing concerns about potential harmful effects on young people, including anxiety and depression.

The idea is to provide youngsters with the Instagram social media experience but with no ads, more parental control and age-appropriate content.

U.S. lawmakers and advocacy groups have urged Facebook to scrap the plan entirely for safety concerns.

“Today is a watershed moment for the growing tech accountability movement and a great day for anyone who believes that children’s wellbeing should come before Big Tech’s profits,” said Josh Golin, executive director of Fairplay, an advocacy group focused on children.

“We commend Facebook for listening to the many voices who have loudly and consistently told them that Instagram Youth will result in significant harms to children.”

Golin vowed to continue fighting against Instagram Kids “until they permanently pull the plug.”

While Instagram Kids would require parental permission to join, the company said it was putting the idea on pause to “continue to build opt-in parental supervision tools for teens,” the company said in a blog post.

“We’ll continue our work to allow parents to oversee their children’s accounts by expanding these tools to teen accounts (aged 13 and over) on Instagram.” 

The company said the reality is that kids are online and that a product like Instagram Kids would be “better for parents.”

Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported internal Facebook documents showed the company knows Instagram can have harmful effects on teens, particularly girls. According to the Journal, Facebook has done little to address the issue.

Facebook called the report inaccurate.

(Some information in this report comes from Reuters.) 
…

A top executive of Chinese communications giant Huawei Technologies has resolved criminal charges against her as part of a deal with the U.S. Justice Department that could pave the way for her to return to China. 

The deal with Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s chief financial officer and the daughter of the company’s founder, was disclosed in federal court in Brooklyn on Friday. It calls for the Justice Department to dismiss the case next December, or four years after her arrest, if she complies with certain conditions. 

The deal, known as a deferred prosecution agreement, resolves a yearslong legal and geopolitical tussle that involved not only the U.S. and China but also Canada, where Meng has remained since her arrest there in December 2018. Meng appeared via videoconference at Friday’s hearing. 

The deal was reached as President Joe Biden and Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping have sought to minimize signs of public tension, even as the world’s two dominant economies are at odds on issues as diverse as cybersecurity, climate change, human rights, and trade and tariffs. 

A spokesperson for Huawei declined to comment, and a spokesman for the Justice Department in Washington did not respond to an email seeking comment. 

Charges unsealed in 2019

Under then-President Donald Trump, the Justice Department unsealed criminal charges in 2019, just before a crucial two-day round of trade talks between the U.S. and China, that accused Huawei of stealing trade secrets. The charges also alleged that Meng had committed fraud by misleading banks about the company’s business dealings in Iran. 

The indictment accuses Huawei of using a Hong Kong shell company called Skycom to sell equipment to Iran in violation of U.S. sanctions. 

Meng fought the Justice Department’s extradition request, and her lawyers called the case against her flawed. Last month, a Canadian judge didn’t rule on whether Meng should be extradited to the U.S. after a Canadian Justice Department lawyer wrapped up his case saying there was enough evidence to show she was dishonest and deserved to stand trial in the U.S. 

Huawei is the biggest global supplier of network gear for phone and internet companies, and some analysts say Chinese companies have flouted international rules and norms amid allegations of technology theft. The company represents China’s progress in becoming a technological power and has been a subject of U.S. security and law enforcement concerns. 

It has repeatedly denied the U.S. government’s allegations and the security concerns about its products. 
…

Using a raised eyebrow or smile, people with speech or physical disabilities can now operate their Android-powered smartphones hands-free, Google said Thursday.

Two new tools put machine learning and front-facing cameras on smartphones to work detecting face and eye movements.

Users can scan their phone screen and select a task by smiling, raising eyebrows, opening their mouth, or looking to the left, right or up.

“To make Android more accessible for everyone, we’re launching new tools that make it easier to control your phone and communicate using facial gestures,” Google said.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that 61 million adults in the United States live with disabilities, which has pushed Google and rivals Apple and Microsoft to make products and services more accessible to them.

“Every day, people use voice commands, like ‘Hey Google,’ or their hands to navigate their phones,” the tech giant said in a blog post.

“However, that’s not always possible for people with severe motor and speech disabilities.”

The changes are the result of two new features, one is called “Camera Switches,” which lets people use their faces instead of swipes and taps to interact with smartphones.

The other is Project Activate, a new Android application which allows people to use those gestures to trigger an action, like having a phone play a recorded phrase, send a text, or make a call.

“Now it’s possible for anyone to use eye movements and facial gestures that are customized to their range of movement to navigate their phone – sans hands and voice,” Google said.

The free Activate app is available in Australia, Britain, Canada and the United States at the Google Play shop.

Apple, Google and Microsoft have consistently rolled out innovations that make internet technology more accessible to people with disabilities or who find that age has made some tasks, such as reading, more difficult.

Voice-commanded digital assistants built into speakers and smartphones can enable people with sight or movement challenges to tell computers what to do.

There is software that identifies text on webpages or in images and then reads it aloud, as well as automatic generation of captions that display what is said in videos.

An “AssistiveTouch” feature that Apple built into the software powering its smart watch lets touchscreen displays be controlled by sensing movements such as finger pinches or hand clenches.

“This feature also works with VoiceOver so you can navigate Apple Watch with one hand while using a cane or leading a service animal,” Apple said in a post.

Computing colossus Microsoft describes accessibility as essential to empowering everyone with technology tools.

“To enable transformative change accessibility needs to be a priority,” Microsoft said in a post.

“We aim to build it into what we design for every team, organization, classroom, and home.” 

 
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BloLab is converting plastic jerricans into computers using recycled components.. Anne Nzouankeu visited the startup in Cotonou, Benin in this story narrated by Moki Edwin Kindzeka.
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Leaders of the United States, Japan, India and Australia will agree to take steps to build secure semiconductor supply chains when they meet in Washington next week, the Nikkei business daily said Saturday, citing a draft of the joint statement.

U.S. President Joe Biden will host a first in-person summit of leaders of the “Quad” countries, which have sought to boost co-operation to push back against China’s growing assertiveness. The draft says that in order to create robust supply chains, the four countries will ascertain their semiconductor supply capacities and identify vulnerability, the Nikkei said, without unveiling how it had obtained the document.

The statement also says the use of advanced technologies should be based on the rule of respecting human rights, the newspaper said on its web site.

The draft does not name China, but the move is aimed at preventing China’s way of utilizing technologies for maintaining an authoritarian regime from spreading to the rest of the world, the Nikkei said.

The United States and China are at odds over issues across the board, including trade and technology, while Biden said in April his country and Japan, a U.S. ally, will invest together in areas such as 5G and semiconductor supply chains.

No officials were immediately available for comment at the Japanese foreign ministry.

 
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Kids across the U.S. are posting TikTok videos of themselves vandalizing school bathrooms and stealing soap dispensers and even turf from football fields, bedeviling school administrators seeking to contain the viral internet trend. 

The “devious licks” challenge that swept social media this week is plaguing principals and school district administrators who already must navigate a bitter debate over requiring masks to keep COVID-19 in check. Some schools have had to more closely monitor or even shut down bathrooms, where much of the damage is occurring. 

No section of the nation appears to have been untouched. In northeastern Kansas, Lawrence High School had to close several bathrooms after students pried soap dispensers off the walls. Then, students tried to steal the “closed” signs, so staff is guarding the bathrooms, even the closed ones, said 17-year-old student Cuyler Dunn, relaying Friday what he called “total destruction.” 

“Some of them were to the point where they were borderline unusable,” said Dunn, who is also the co-editor-in-chief of Lawrence High’s student newspaper. “Locks on stalls had been taken off.”

Ice Bucket Challenge

While social media did spawn the Ice Bucket Challenge to raise money for research into the condition known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, it also led to a rash of poisonings several years ago when teenagers swallowed pods of laundry detergent for the “Tide Pods challenge.” The latest trend follows close upon a viral challenge to walk on stacks of milk crates.

Some school officials are reluctant to say much about “devious licks,” which is slang for theft. In Virginia, Fairfax County Public Schools spokesperson Kathleen Miller emailed that officials were aware of several incidents of property damage and that “disciplinary action has and will be taken.” 

Outside of that statement, Miller noted that the school district was saying little to avoid “encouraging copy-cat behavior.” 

A spokesperson said TikTok was removing “devious licks” content and redirecting hashtags and search results to its guidelines to discourage the behavior and that it doesn’t allow content that “promotes or enables criminal activities.”

While some school officials say they don’t know what caused the “devious licks” challenge to go viral, others chalk it up to a desire for peers’ attention or adolescents’ lack of impulse control. Some incidents have involved smashing things, like bathroom mirrors and sinks.

Tradition of senior pranks

Dunn said that his Kansas high school has a tradition of senior pranks that led someone to set chickens loose inside last year. But he said some students are starting to worry about the repercussions of “devious licks,” not only for kids who get caught but also for big events as the school tries to prevent thefts. His newspaper wrote about “devious licks” this week.

He said a detour sign taken from another school after a football game is in Lawrence High’s parking lot and that students even stole a small section of artificial turf off the school’s football field.

“The general vibe around the student body is that this is just another one of those funny things that high schoolers do,” he said. “But it has started to reach a point where it is starting to get in the way of things.” 

Damage displayed on social media

Northeast of Sacramento, California, the Rocklin school district has seen students destroy soap dispensers, damage faucets, plug toilets with whole rolls of toilet paper and tear mirrors and railings off walls, then share videos and photos on social media.

Spokesperson Sundeep Dosanjh said that the damage can close bathrooms for extended periods, an issue potentially made worse by “national supply chain disruptions” that have arisen amid the coronavirus pandemic.

Police in the central Florida city of Bartow, located about 50 miles east of Tampa, said they arrested a 15-year-old student who vandalized a new building’s bathroom by tearing off soap dispensers and leaving one in a sink. 

“He said he did it because of this TikTok challenge and he wanted to be cool,” police Chief Bryan Dorman said. 

In the Cherry Creek school district serving an affluent Denver neighborhood and nearby trendy suburbs, the district sent parents of middle and high school students a letter warning that kids who are caught face being suspended, could be forced to make restitution and might have their cases forwarded to police.

Warnings sent to parents

Districts in Miami and Scottsdale, Arizona, sent similar warnings to parents.

Cherry Creek spokesperson Abbe Smith said its schools had seen “a handful” of incidents of damage to or theft of soap dispensers, toilet paper dispensers and fire extinguishers. 

In southern Alabama, Robertsdale High School’s principal said a student there is facing criminal charges after he was caught on surveillance cameras swiping a fire extinguisher. He also was suspended from school. 

Punishments aren’t effective

In Wichita, Kansas, the district has found that punishments like suspensions aren’t effective in stopping such behavior, and community service is the more likely response, said Terri Moses, its director of safety services. The district’s middle schools have lost soap dispensers, paper towels and toilet paper. 

And, she said, the district warns students that what they post now could hurt their chances of getting jobs in their early 20s. 

“What they’re putting out on social media is giong to be with them for a long time,” Moses said. “We’re trying very hard to relay that.” 

 
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The U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, Michelle Bachelet, is calling for a moratorium on the sale and use of artificial intelligence systems, which she says pose a serious risk to human rights. The High Commissioner’s report, which will be submitted to the U.N. human rights council, provides an analysis of how advances in digital technologies are affecting people’s human rights.   The report argues that artificial intelligence, or AI, can be a force for good, but also can be overly intrusive and have negative, even catastrophic, effects on people’s right to privacy and other human rights. Peggy Hicks, director of thematic engagement at the U.N. Human Rights Office, says AI systems can be faulty and have embedded biases. These, she says, can lead to discrimination that might jeopardize job prospects or welfare and social security benefits.   She says there are numerous cases of people being treated unjustly because of the faulty use of AI in law enforcement, national security, and criminal justice and border management areas. “We see AI being used for profiling and suspect identification,” she said. “Biometric technology, such as facial recognition and emotional recognition, are being used, including remotely in real time to identify people — with documented cases of erroneous identification and disproportionate impact on certain groups, often minorities.”   The report notes biometric technologies increasingly are being used by governments, international organizations, and technology companies to identify people in real time and from a distance. This potentially allows unlimited tracking of individuals. Hicks says the High Commissioner specifically recommends a moratorium on the use of remote biometric recognition technology in public spaces given the serious threats to public freedoms associated with such surveillance. “Without immediate and far-reaching shifts and how we address AI deployment and development, the existing harms will multiply at scale and with speed,” she said. “And the worst part of it is, we will not even know the extent of the problem because there is so little transparency around artificial intelligence and its use.”   U.N. rights chief Bachelet says there needs to be much greater transparency by companies and states in how they are developing and using AI. She says the power of AI to serve people is undeniable, but so is its ability to invade their privacy and violate human rights on an enormous scale and with virtually no visibility. 
 
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Apple released a critical software patch to fix a security vulnerability that researchers said could allow hackers to directly infect iPhones and other Apple devices without any user action.
 
Researchers at the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab said the security issue was exploited to plant spyware on a Saudi activist’s iPhone. They said they had high confidence that the world’s most infamous hacker-for-hire firm, Israel’s NSO Group, was behind that attack.
 
The previously unknown vulnerability affected all major Apple devices — iPhones, Macs and Apple Watches — the researchers said. NSO Group responded with a one-sentence statement saying it will continue providing tools for fighting “terror and crime.”
 
It was the first time a so-called “zero-click” exploit — one that doesn’t require users to click on suspect links or open infected files — has been caught and analyzed, the researchers said. They found the malicious code on September 7 and immediately alerted Apple. The targeted activist asked to remain anonymous, they said.
 
“We’re not necessarily attributing this attack to the Saudi government,” said researcher Bill Marczak.  
 
Citizen Lab previously found evidence of zero-click exploits being used to hack into the phones of Al-Jazeera journalists and other targets but hasn’t previously seen the malicious code itself.
 
Although security experts say that average iPhone, iPad and Mac user generally need not worry — such attacks tend to be limited to specific targets — the discovery still alarmed security professionals.
 
Malicious image files were transmitted to the activist’s phone via the iMessage instant-messaging app before it was hacked with NSO’s Pegasus spyware, which opens a phone to eavesdropping and remote data theft, Marczak said. It was discovered during a second examination of the phone, which forensics showed had been infected in March. He said the malicious file causes devices to crash.
 
Citizen Lab says the case reveals, once again, that NSO Group is allowing its spyware to be used against ordinary civilians.
 
In a blog post, Apple said it was issuing a security update for iPhones and iPads because a “maliciously crafted” PDF file could lead to them being hacked. It said it was aware that the issue may have been exploited and cited Citizen Lab.  
 
In a subsequent statement, Apple security chief Ivan Krstić commended Citizen Lab and said such exploits “are not a threat to the overwhelming majority of our users.” He noted, as he has in the past, that such exploits typically cost millions of dollars to develop and often have a short shelf life.  
 
Apple didn’t respond to questions regarding whether this was the first time it had patched a zero-click vulnerability.
 
Users should get alerts on their iPhones prompting them to update the phone’s iOS software. Those who want to jump the gun can go into the phone settings, click “General” then “Software Update,” and trigger the patch update directly.
 
Citizen Lab called the iMessage exploit FORCEDENTRY and said it was effective against Apple iOS, MacOS and WatchOS devices. It urged people to immediately install security updates.
 
Researcher John Scott-Railton said the news highlights the importance of securing popular messaging apps against such attacks.
 
“Chat apps are increasingly becoming a major way that nation-states and mercenary hackers are gaining access to phones,” he said. “And, it’s why it’s so important that companies focus on making sure that they are as locked down as possible.”
 
The researchers said it also undermines NSO Group’s claims that it only sells its spyware to law enforcement officials for use against criminals and terrorists and audits its customers to ensure it’s not abused.
 
“If Pegasus was only being used against criminals and terrorists, we never would have found this stuff,” said Marczak.
 
Facebook’s WhatsApp also was allegedly targeted by an NSO zero-click exploit. In October 2019, Facebook sued NSO in U.S. federal court for allegedly targeting some 1,400 users of the encrypted messaging service with spyware.
 
In July, a global media consortium published a damning report on how clients of NSO Group have been spying for years on journalists, human rights activists, political dissidents, and people close to them, with the hacker-for-hire group directly involved in the targeting.  
 
Amnesty International said it confirmed 37 successful Pegasus infections based on a leaked targeting list whose origin was not disclosed.One case involved the fiancee of Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi just four days after he was killed in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul in 2018. The CIA attributed the murder to the Saudi government.
 
The recent revelations also prompted calls for an investigation into whether Hungary’s right-wing government used Pegasus to secretly monitor critical journalists, lawyers and business figures. India’s parliament also erupted in protests as opposition lawmakers accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government of using NSO Groups’ product to spy on political opponents and others.
 
France also is trying to get to the bottom of allegations that President Emmanuel Macron and members of his government may have been targeted in 2019 by an unidentified Moroccan security service using Pegasus.
 
Morocco, a key French ally, denied those reports and is taking legal action to counter allegations implicating the North African kingdom in the spyware scandal. 
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A robot called Moxi is helping nurses and hospital staff focus more on patients by taking care of menial tasks. The VOA’s Deana Mitchell has the story.   
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Four people are set to become the world’s first all-civilian crew to fly into Earth orbit when they blast off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center Wednesday as space tourism takes its biggest leap yet.  Weather conditions are 70% favorable for Wednesday night’s scheduled launch of Americans Jared Isaacman, Hayley Arceneaux, Chris Sembroski and Sian Proctor from the U.S. spaceport’s historic Launch Pad 39A, which was used for the Apollo moon missions during the 1960s and 70s.  The four-member crew will fly into space aboard the Crew Dragon spacecraft built by SpaceX, the privately-run company which has begun sending astronauts to the International Space Station. The fully automated Crew Dragon spacecraft will take the crew to an altitude of 575 kilometers above the Earth’s surface, just above the current positions of both the ISS and the Hubble Space Telescope.   SpaceX said the four space tourists will “conduct scientific research designed to advance human health on Earth and during future long-duration spaceflights” before splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean near the Florida coast three days later.   The mission, dubbed Inspiration4, will be led by the 38-year-old Isaacman, a billionaire technology entrepreneur and founder of an online payment-processing company who is said to have paid SpaceX several million dollars for the flight. The 29-year-old Arceneaux is a childhood bone cancer survivor who has a titanium rod in her leg, which makes her the first person to fly in space with a prosthesis. Sembroski is a 42-year-old retired U.S. Air Force ballistic missile maintenance engineer who now works in the aviation industry, while 51-year-old Proctor is a geoscientist and community college professor who was a NASA astronaut finalist in 2009.  Sembroski and Proctor were selected through a nationwide search contest, while Arceneaux is flying as a representative of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, where she was treated during her battle with cancer and now works as a physician’s assistant. Isaacman is using the flight to raise $100 million for St. Jude, and has pledged $100 million of his own money to the hospital. Isaacman’s flight will far exceed those of fellow billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos, who each took brief non-orbital flights to the edge of space aboard their own self-financed vehicles — Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin, respectively — earlier this year.      Some information for this report came from the Associated Press, Reuters and Agence France Presse. 
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A cyber surveillance company based in Israel developed a tool to break into Apple iPhones with a never-before-seen technique that has been in use since February, internet security watchdog group Citizen Lab said Monday. The discovery is important because of the critical nature of the vulnerability, which requires no user interaction and affects all versions of Apple’s iOS, OSX, and watchOS, except for those updated Monday. The vulnerability developed by the Israeli firm, named NSO Group, defeats security systems designed by Apple in recent years. Apple said it fixed the vulnerability in Monday’s software update, confirming Citizen Lab’s finding. An Apple spokesperson declined to comment regarding whether the hacking technique came from NSO Group. In a statement to Reuters, NSO did not confirm or deny that it was behind the technique, saying only that it would “continue to provide intelligence and law enforcement agencies around the world with life-saving technologies to fight terror and crime.” Citizen Lab said it found the malware on the phone of an unnamed Saudi activist and that the phone had been infected with spyware in February. It is unknown how many other users may have been infected. The intended targets would not have to click on anything for the attack to work. Researchers said they did not believe there would be any visible indication that a hack had occurred. The vulnerability lies in how iMessage automatically renders images. IMessage has been repeatedly targeted by NSO and other cyber arms dealers, prompting Apple to update its architecture. But that upgrade has not fully protected the system. “Popular chat apps are at risk of becoming the soft underbelly of device security. Securing them should be top priority,” said Citizen Lab researcher John Scott-Railton. The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency had no immediate comment. Explosion in attacksCitizen Lab said multiple details in the malware overlapped with prior attacks by NSO, including some that were never publicly reported. One process within the hack’s code was named “setframed,” the same name given in a 2020 infection of a device used by journalists at Al Jazeera, the researchers found. “The security of devices is increasingly challenged by attackers,” said Citizen Lab researcher Bill Marczak. A record number of previously unknown attack methods, which can be sold for $1 million or more, have been revealed this year. The attacks are labeled “zero-day” because software companies had zero days’ notice of the problem. New cybersecurity focusAlong with a surge in ransomware attacks against critical infrastructure, the explosion in such attacks has stoked a new focus on cybersecurity in the White House as well as renewed calls for regulation and international agreements to rein in malicious hacking. As previously reported, the FBI has been investigating NSO, and Israel has set up a senior inter-ministerial team to assess allegations that its spyware has been abused on a global scale. Although NSO has said it vets the governments it sells to, its Pegasus spyware has been found on the phones of activists, journalists and opposition politicians in countries with poor human rights records. 
 
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SpaceX is set to launch four people into space Wednesday on a three-day mission that is the first to orbit the Earth with exclusively private citizens on board, as Elon Musk’s company enters the space tourism fray.    The “Inspiration4” mission caps a summer that saw billionaires Richard Branson and Jeff Bezos cross the final frontier, on Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin spaceships respectively, a few days apart in July. The SpaceX flight has been chartered by American billionaire Jared Isaacman, the 38-year-old founder and CEO of payment processing company Shift4 Payment. He is also a seasoned pilot. The exact price he paid SpaceX hasn’t been disclosed, but it runs into the tens of millions of dollars.   The mission itself is far more ambitious in scope than the few weightless minutes Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin customers can buy. The SpaceX Crew Dragon will be flying further than the orbit of the International Space Station.   “The risk is not zero,” said Isaacman in an episode of a Netflix documentary about the mission. “You’re riding a rocket at 17,500 miles (28,000 kilometers) per hour around the Earth. In that kind of environment there’s risks.” SpaceX has already given no fewer than ten astronauts rides to the ISS on behalf of NASA — but this will be the first time taking non-professional astronauts. Lift-off is scheduled for Wednesday from 8:00 pm Eastern Time (0000 GMT) from launch pad 39A, at NASA’s Kennedy Center in Florida, from where the Apollo missions to the Moon took off. ‘Are we going to the Moon?’In addition to Isaacman, who is the mission commander, three non-public figures were selected for the voyage via a process that was first advertised at the Super Bowl in February.    Each crew member was picked to represent a pillar of the mission.   The youngest, Hayley Arceneaux, is a childhood bone cancer survivor, who represents “hope.”  She will become the first person with a prosthetic to go to space. “Are we going to the Moon?” she asked, when she was offered her spot.   “Apparently people haven’t gone there in decades. I learned that,” she laughed, in the documentary.   The 29-year-old was picked because she works as a Physician Assistant in Memphis for St. Jude’s Hospital, the charitable beneficiary of Inspiration4.   One of the donors secured the seat of “generosity”: Chris Sembroski, 42, is a former US Air Force veteran who now works in the aviation industry.  The last seat represents “prosperity” and was offered to Sian Proctor, a 51-year-old earth science professor who, in 2009, narrowly missed out on becoming a NASA astronaut. She will be only the fourth African American woman to go to space. Months of trainingThe crew’s training has lasted months and has included experiencing high G force on a centrifuge — a giant arm that rotates rapidly.    They have also gone on parabolic flights to experience weightlessness for a few seconds and completed a high altitude, snowy trek on Mount Rainier in the northwestern United States. They spent time at the SpaceX base, though the flight itself will be fully autonomous.   Over the three days of orbit, their sleep, heart rate, blood and cognitive abilities will be analyzed.  Tests will be carried out before and after the flight to study the effect of the trip on their body.  The idea is to accumulate data for future missions with private passengers.     The stated goal of the mission is to make space accessible for more people, although space travel remains for the moment only partially open to a privileged few.   “In all of human history, fewer than 600 humans have reached space,” said Isaacman.  “We are proud that our flight will help influence all those who will travel after us.” 
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