Facebook owner Meta Platforms FB.O will help train Australian political candidates on aspects of cyber security and coach influencers to stop the spread of misinformation in a bid to boost the integrity of an upcoming election, it said on Tuesday.

Australia has not yet set a date for its next election, which is due by May. Authorities are already on high alert for electoral interference, having previously highlighted foreign interference attempts aimed at all levels of government and targeting both sides of politics.

“We’ll stay vigilant to emerging threats and take additional steps, if necessary, to prevent abuse on our platform while also empowering people in Australia to use their voice by voting,” Josh Machin, the company’s Australian chief of public policy, said in a statement that is to be posted online.

The social media giant added that it had drafted in a university to help with fact-checking operations in Australia and would require disclosure of the names of those paying for election-related advertisements, in what it called its most comprehensive election strategy.

The steps show how social media firms are seeking to combat online distortion and abuse of information during the lead-up to an election, a time when such efforts are typically at their most heated.

The Facebook Protect security program for high-profile individuals launched in Australia in December, with the company vowing to work with election officials and political parties to offer training for candidates on its policies and tools and ways to keep safe.

To avert hacking, it will prompt candidates to upgrade security to two-factor authentication. The company said it would also coach influencers, or those who earn advertising income from online commentary, to spot fake news.

People seeking to run election-related ads will need to furnish government-issued identification, as well as mandatory disclosures of funding sources for them, it said.

Ads by unauthorized parties, without funding disclosure, would be taken down and stored in a public archive for seven years, it added.

RMIT University, which joined Meta’s third-party fact-checking effort, said it would review posts the company identified as potential misinformation and try to verify them via interviews with primary sources and checks of public data.

“A continuing focus of our work is to identify the super spreaders of misinformation and the ecosystems in which they operate,” said RMIT FactLab Director Russell Skelton in a statement. “High impact misinformation disrupts evidence-based public policy and debate and so it is crucial we gain a better understanding of what drives this.” 
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From the three-light traffic signal, refrigerated trucks, automatic elevator doors, color monitors for desktop computers, to the shape of the modern ironing board, the clothes wringer, blood banks, laser treatment for cataracts, home security systems and the super-soaker children’s toy, many objects and services Americans use every day were invented by Black men and women.

These innovators were recognized for their inventions, but countless other inventors of color have gone largely unrecognized. Others are completely lost to history.

“There were some instances where Black inventors would compete with Alexander Graham Bell, with Thomas Edison, where their inventions were really just as good and just as transformative, but they just did not have access to the capital,” says Shontavia Johnson, an entrepreneur and associate vice president for entrepreneurship and innovation at Clemson University in South Carolina. “They did not have access to all these different systems that the United States puts in place to support inventors.”

Thomas Edison is credited with inventing the lightbulb, but it was Lewis Latimer, the son of formerly enslaved people, who patented a new filament that extended the lifespan of lightbulbs so they wouldn’t die out after a few days. Latimer got a patent for his invention in 1882, something countless Black innovators in the generations before him were unable to do.

Free Black citizens could obtain patents from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, but enslaved Black people could not. Slavery wasn’t abolished until 1865, with the adoption of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Prior to that, the inventions of Black innovators were often claimed by their enslavers or other white people.

Modern-day research suggests that was the case with the technology behind the cotton gin — a device that separated cotton seeds from their fibers. It was largely innovated by enslaved Black people, but a white man named Eli Whitney obtained the patent for the invention.

“We often count our country as being this place where innovation and entrepreneurship thrive,” Johnson says. “But when you completely exclude a group of people from access to the patent system, … exploiting their invention, then the natural result of that is, you look at the most important inventors and innovators in American history … and they pretty much are your stereotypical white male inventor, not because other people have not been innovative, too, it’s just these folks have been excluded from the patent system.”

This deliberate early exclusion of Black inventors from the patent system and, in large part, the pantheon of great American inventors, was rooted in racist assumptions about the intellectual inferiority of Black people, according to Rayvon Fouché, a professor of American studies at Purdue University in Lafayette, Indiana.

“Invention was seen as this God-given ability. So, as you can imagine, all the perceptions, ideas about masculinity, maleness, power [and] authority are all wrapped into this vision of inventiveness,” says Fouché, who also leads the National Science Foundation’s Social and Economic Sciences Division. “The inherent understanding of what an inventor is and was and could be — the framing of that term — eliminated the possibility for all Black folks and all marginalized people.”

Other barriers Black inventors historically faced included less access to equal education, systematic exclusion from professional scientific and engineering

societies, limited access to wealthy investors and mainstream banks for start-up capital to commercialize their inventions, and racial violence.

Black inventors were also less involved in patenting activity between 1870 and 1940, during times of lynchings, race riots and segregation laws in the United States.

There were also the Black creators who came up with innovations that didn’t necessarily fit the traditional ideas of inventiveness.

“For much of our history, when we think about the word ‘invention,’ it’s sort of freighted with these white, Eurocentric notions of what that means,” says Eric Hintz, a historian with the Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. “Often, the traditional definition of ‘invention’ is something like a machine that saves human labor or animal labor, that does some task more efficiently.”

That kept certain innovations by Black people from being recognized by the patent system.

“[The patent system] is built on this model that basically assumes innovation is desirable when it’s tied to commercial benefit. But if it is rooted in community survival or the needs of society, that is not worthy of protection, and we see that in the law,” Johnson says. “There are certain types of things that are patentable, and certain things that are not patentable, and that is a distinction that I do think leaves a lot of people out of the ecosystem.”

A New York DJ known as Grandmaster Flash pioneered the use of record turntables as an instrument by using his fingers to manipulate the sounds backward and forward or to slow it down. He had an innovative style of mixing records and blending beats that pioneered the art of deejaying, but he holds no patents.

“Black people have been doing lots of creative, innovative things,” Fouché says. “We can think about all kinds of technological creative things within the context of hip-hop and music production and art in other ways. But of course, the patent office is driven by techno-scientific innovation. And I think part of it is, for me, to open up the conversation of what inventiveness is and can be.”

Museum collections have historically excluded the contributions of marginalized people, a failing the Smithsonian’s Lemelson Center readily acknowledges.

“Definitely the Smithsonian and other libraries and museums have been complicit over the decades, over the centuries, of privileging white inventors in the things that we collect,” says Hintz. “We have a ton of stuff on Edison and Tesla [electricity] and Steve Jobs [innovator of Apple products and devices] and whomever, but it’s incumbent on us now to make sure that we’re preserving the stories of Madam C.J. Walker, Grandmaster Flash, Lonnie Johnson — who invented the Super Soaker, of Patricia Bath, an ophthalmologist who invented a way of eradicating cataracts.”

Walker, America’s first self-made female millionaire, built her fortune with a line of hair care products for Black women. Black people also invented the clothes dryer, the automatic gear shift in vehicles, the modern toilet, lawn sprinkler, peanut butter and potato chips.

But the innovation gap persists. African Americans and women still participate at each stage of the innovation process at lower rates than their male and white counterparts.

“How do you get more Black kids, girls [and] marginalized people into these pathways that have been traditionally white, middle class and male?” Fouché says, emphasizing the importance of sparking children’s imaginations, despite any obstacles.

“I’m more interested in saying, ‘Well, what do you want to do? How do you want to change the world? What are the things that are meaningful to you?’ and just impressing upon people the limitless opportunities. … So, don’t limit the possibilities.”
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U.S. authorities have broadly expanded the use of a smartphone app during the coronavirus pandemic to ensure immigrants released from detention will attend deportation hearings, a requirement that advocates say violates their privacy and makes them feel they’re not free.

More than 125,000 people — many of them stopped at the U.S.-Mexico border — are now compelled to install the app known as SmartLink on their phones, up from about 5,000 less than three years ago. It allows officials to easily check on them by requiring the immigrants to send a selfie or make or receive a phone call when asked.

Although the technology is less cumbersome than an ankle monitor, advocates say tethering immigrants to the app is unfair considering many have paid bond to get out of U.S. detention facilities while their cases churn through the country’s backlogged immigration courts. Immigration proceedings are administrative, not criminal, and the overwhelming majority of people with cases before the courts aren’t detained.

Advocates said they’re concerned about how the U.S. government might use data culled from the app on immigrants’ whereabouts and contacts to round up and arrest others on immigration violations.

“It’s kind of been shocking how just in a couple of years it has exploded so quickly and is now being used so much and everywhere,” said Jacinta Gonzalez, senior campaign director for the Latino rights organization Mijente. “It’s making it much easier for the government to track a larger number of people.”

The use of the app by Immigration and Customs Enforcement soared during the pandemic, when many government services went online. It continued to grow as President Joe Biden called on the Department of Justice to curb the use of private prisons. His administration has also voiced support for so-called alternatives to detention to ensure immigrants attend required appointments such as immigration court hearings.

Meanwhile, the number of cases before the long-backlogged U.S. immigration court system has soared to 1.6 million. Immigrants often must wait for years to get a hearing before a judge who will determine whether they can stay in the country legally or should be deported.

Since the pandemic, U.S. immigration authorities have reduced the number of immigrants in detention facilities and touted detention alternatives such as the app.

The SmartLink app comes from BI Inc, a Boulder, Colorado-based subsidiary of private prison company The GEO Group. GEO, which runs immigration detention facilities for ICE under other contracts, declined to comment on the app.

Officials at Immigration and Customs Enforcement, which is part of the Department of Homeland Security, declined to answer questions about the app, but said in a statement that detention alternatives “are an effective method of tracking noncitizens released from DHS custody who are awaiting their immigration proceedings.”

In recent congressional testimony, agency officials wrote that the SmartLink app is also cheaper than detention: it costs about $4.36 a day to put a person on a detention alternative and more than $140 a day to hold someone in a facility, agency budget estimates show.

Advocates say immigrants who spent months in detention facilities and were released on bond are being placed on the app when they go to an initial meeting with a deportation officer, and so are parents and children seeking asylum on the southwest border.

Initially, SmartLink was seen as a less intensive alternative to ankle monitors for immigrants who had been detained and released, but it is now being used widely on immigrants with no criminal history and who have not been detained at all, said Julie Mao, deputy director of the immigrant rights group Just Futures. Previously, immigrants often only attended periodic check-ins at agency offices.

“We’re very concerned that that is going to be used as the excessive standard for everyone who’s in the immigration system,” Mao said.

While most people attend their immigration court hearings, some do skip out. In those cases, immigration judges issue deportation orders in the immigrants’ absence, and deportation agents are tasked with trying to find them and return them to their countries. During the 2018 fiscal year, about a quarter of immigration judges’ case decisions were deportation orders for people who missed court, court data shows.

Advocates questioned whether monitoring systems matter in these cases, noting someone who wants to avoid court will stop checking in with deportation officers, trash their phone and move, whether on SmartLink or not.

They said they’re concerned that deportation agents could be tracking immigrants through SmartLink more than they are aware, just as commercial apps tap into location data on people’s phones.

In the criminal justice system, law enforcement agencies are using similar apps for defendants awaiting trial or serving sentences. Robert Magaletta, chief executive of Louisiana-based Shadowtrack Technologies, said the technology doesn’t continually track defendants but records their locations at check-ins, and that the company offers a separate, full-time tracking service to law enforcement agencies using tamperproof watches.

In a 2019 Congressional Research Service report, ICE said the app wasn’t continually monitoring immigrants. But advocates said even quick snapshots of people’s locations during check-ins could be used to track down friends and co-workers who lack proper immigration authorization. They noted immigration investigators pulled GPS data from the ankle monitors of Mississippi poultry plant workers to help build a case for a large workplace raid.

For immigrants released from detention with ankle monitors that irritate the skin and beep loudly at times, the app is an improvement, said Mackenzie Mackins, an immigration attorney in Los Angeles. It’s less painful and more discreet, she said, adding the ankle monitors made her clients feel they were viewed by others as criminals.

But SmartLink can be stressful for immigrants who came to the U.S. fleeing persecution in their countries, and for those who fear a technological glitch could lead to a missed check-in.

Rosanne Flores, a paralegal at Hilf and Hilf in Troy, Michigan, said she recently fielded panicked calls from clients because the app wasn’t working. They wound up having to report in person to immigration agents’ offices instead.

“I see the agony it causes the clients,” Flores said. “My heart goes out to them.” 
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Facebook said Thursday that because of the invasion of Ukraine, it has temporarily eased its rules regarding violent speech.

Moscow’s internationally condemned invasion of its neighbor has provoked unprecedented sanctions from Western governments and businesses, but also a surge of online anger.

“As a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we have temporarily made allowances for forms of political expression that would normally violate our rules like violent speech such as ‘death to the Russian invaders,'” Facebook’s parent company Meta said in a statement.

“We still won’t allow credible calls for violence against Russian civilians,” it added.

Facebook made its statement after a Reuters report, citing the firm’s emails to its content moderators, which said the policy applies to Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia and Ukraine.

Facebook and other U.S. tech giants have moved to penalize Russia for the attack on Ukraine, and Moscow has also moved to block access to the leading social media network as well as Twitter.

Russia thus joins the small club of countries barring the largest social network in the world, along with China and North Korea.

Since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine last month, Russian authorities also have stepped up pressure against independent media.

Blocking of Facebook and restricting of Twitter last week came the same day Moscow backed the imposition of jail terms on media publishing “false information” about the military.

In this context, Facebook had played a key information distribution role in Russia, even as it endures withering criticism in the West over matters ranging from political division to teenagers’ mental health.

The war is, meanwhile, taking place during a period of unprecedented crackdown on the Russian opposition, with has included protest leaders being assassinated, jailed or forced out of the country.

Big U.S. tech firms like Apple and Microsoft have announced halting the sale of their products in Russia, while other companies have paused certain business activities or ties.

Ukrainian officials have been campaigning heavily for Russia to be cut off from everything from Netflix to Instagram. 
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A Ukrainian man charged last year with conducting one of the most severe ransomware attacks against U.S. targets has been extradited to the United States and made a court appearance Wednesday, the U.S. Justice Department said.

According to an August 2021 indictment, Yaroslav Vasinskyi accessed the internal computer networks of several victim companies and deployed Sodinokibi/REvil ransomware to encrypt the data on their computers, the Justice Department said in a statement.

Vasinskyi was allegedly responsible for the July 2021 ransomware attack against Florida software provider Kaseya, the department said.

Reuters could not reach a representative of Vasinskyi. Kaseya did not immediately return a message seeking comment.

The Ukrainian national was accused in the indictment of breaking into Kaseya over the July 4 weekend last year and simultaneously distributing with accomplices REvil ransomware to as many as 1,500 Kaseya customers, encrypting their data and forcing some to shut down for days, the Justice Department said.

While most of the 1,500 businesses paralyzed as a result around the globe faced limited concerns, the disruption was felt keenly in places such as Sweden, where hundreds of supermarkets had to close because their cash registers were inoperative, and New Zealand, where schools and kindergartens were knocked offline.

Vasinskyi was charged in the indictment with breaking into the victim companies and installing encryption software developed by the core REvil ransomware hacking group. REvil directly handled the ransom negotiations and split the profits with Vasinskyi and other affiliates. This model allowed the notorious ransomware gang to extort numerous companies for cryptocurrency.

Vasinskyi was arrested in Poland in October. The Justice Department charged him and a Russian late last year.

U.S. law enforcement authorities transported Vasinskyi to Dallas, Texas, where he arrived March 3, the Justice Department said Wednesday.

REvil was involved in an attack last year against top global meat processor JBS S.A.
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A bipartisan group of lawmakers has written a letter asking the Department of Justice to determine whether online retailer Amazon engaged in obstruction of Congress during an investigation of the company’s competitive practices. 

The letter said the company had “engaged in a pattern and practice of misleading conduct” that suggested it had sought to influence or obstruct an investigation into how it operates. 

The House Judiciary Committee conducted a 16-month probe into how Amazon, Apple, Google and Facebook operated. 

During the investigation, lawmakers focused on Amazon’s use of private-label products and collection of third-party data. 

Amazon allegedly copied popular products in India and then manipulated search results to increase the sales of its own products, Reuters reported. 

The committee’s letter to DOJ alleges Amazon made untrue or misleading statements when asked about those practices. It also said Amazon refused to provide evidence that would “either corroborate its claims or correct the record,” according to the 24-page letter. 

“It appears to have done so to conceal the truth about its use of third-party sellers’ data to advantage its private-label business and its preferencing of private-label products in search results — subjects of the Committee’s investigation,” according to the letter, which was signed by House Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler, House Antitrust Subcommittee Chair David Cicilline, and Democratic and Republican committee members.  

“As a result, we have no choice but to refer this matter to the Department of Justice to investigate whether Amazon and its executives obstructed Congress in violation of applicable federal law,” the letter added. 

Amazon told CNBC that “there’s no factual basis for this, as demonstrated in the huge volume of information we’ve provided over several years of good faith cooperation with this investigation.” 

When Amazon founder Jeff Bezos testified to the committee in July 2020, he said the company prevents Amazon employees from using seller data but could not say it had never happened. 

Lawmakers said investigations by news organizations like Reuters and The Wall Street Journal contradicted Bezos’ testimony, as well as testimony of other Amazon employees. 

“Amazon attempted to clean up the inaccurate testimony through ever-shifting explanations of its internal policies and denials of the investigative reports,” the lawmakers said. “The committee uncovered evidence from former Amazon employees, and former and current sellers, that corroborated the reports’ claims.” 

“After Amazon was caught in a lie and repeated misrepresentations, it stonewalled the committee’s efforts to uncover the truth,” the letter said.  

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters. 

 
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Russia’s blocking of Facebook is a symptom of its broader effort to cut itself off from sources of information that could imperil its internationally condemned invasion of Ukraine, experts say.

The often-criticized social network is part of a web of information sources that can challenge the Kremlin’s preferred perspective that its assault on Ukraine is righteous and necessary.

Blocking of Facebook and restricting of Twitter on Friday came the same day Moscow backed the imposition of jail terms on media publishing “false information” about the military.

Russia’s motivation “is to suppress political challenges at a very fraught moment for (Vladimir) Putin, and the regime, when it comes to those asking very tough questions about why Russia is continuing to prosecute this war,” said Steven Feldstein, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Russia thus joins the very small club of countries barring the largest social network in the world, along with China and North Korea.

Moscow was expected to quickly overpower its neighbor but the campaign has already shown signs that it could go longer and could lead to the unleashing of its full military ferocity.

“It’s a censorship tool of last resort,” Feldstein added. “They are pulling the plug on a platform rather than try to block pages or use all sorts of other mechanisms that they traditionally do.”

Earlier this week independent monitoring group OVD-Info said that more than 7,000 people in Russia had been detained at demonstrations over Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine.

Web monitoring group NetBlocks said Russia’s moves against the social media giants come amid a backdrop of protests “which are coordinated and mobilized through social media and messaging applications.”

The war is meanwhile taking place during a period of unprecedented crackdown on the Russian opposition, with has included protest leaders being assassinated, jailed or forced out of the country.

‘No access to truth’

Since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine last week, Russian authorities have stepped up pressure against independent media even though press freedoms in the country were already rapidly waning.

In this context, Facebook plays a key information distribution role in Russia, even as it endures withering criticism in the West over matters ranging from political division to teenagers’ mental health.

Natalia Krapiva, tech legal counsel at rights group Access Now, said social media has been a place where independent, critical voices have been talking about the invasion.

“Facebook is one of the key platforms in Russia,” she said, adding that its loss is “a devastating blow to access to independent information and for resistance to the war.”

Russia has been hit with unprecedented sanctions from the West over the invasion, but also rejections both symbolic and significant from sources ranging from sporting organizations to U.S. tech companies.

Facebook’s parent Meta and Twitter however have engaged on the very sensitive issue of information by blocking the spread of Russian state-linked news media.

Russia’s media regulator took aim at both, with Roskomnadzor accusing Facebook of discrimination toward state media.

Big U.S. tech firms like Apple and Microsoft have announced halting the sale of their products in Russia, while other companies have made public their “pauses” of certain business activities or ties.

On Friday U.S. internet service provider Cogent Communications said it had “terminated its contracts with customers billing out of Russia.”

The Washington Post reported Cogent has “several dozen customers in Russia, with many of them, such as state-owned telecommunications giant Rostelecom, being close to the government.”

It’s exactly the kind of measure Ukrainian officials have been campaigning heavily for as they ask Russia be cut off from everything from Netflix to Instagram.

Yet experts like Krapiva worry about what that would mean for dissenting or critical voices inside Russia.

“There’s a risk of people having no access to truth,” she said.

“Some Ukrainians have been calling for disconnecting Russia from the internet, but that’s counterproductive to disconnect civil society in Russia who are trying to fight.”  
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Software giant Microsoft announced Friday that it is suspending “all new sales of Microsoft products and services in Russia” over that country’s invasion of Ukraine.

“Like the rest of the world, we are horrified, angered and saddened by the images and news coming from the war in Ukraine and condemn this unjustified, unprovoked and unlawful invasion by Russia,” the company said in a statement.

The company added that it was ‘stopping many aspects of our business in Russia in compliance with governmental sanctions decisions.’

Many companies have announced they are ending or limiting their activity in Russia. Some companies include Apple, Nike and Dell Technologies.

Microsoft added that it will continue to work with Ukraine to protect the country from Russian cyberattacks, noting it already had during an attack on a “major Ukrainian broadcaster.”

“Since the war began, we have acted against Russian positioning, destructive or disruptive measures against more than 20 Ukrainian government, IT and financial sector organizations,” Microsoft said. “We have also acted against cyberattacks targeting several additional civilian sites. We have publicly raised our concerns that these attacks against civilians violate the Geneva Convention.”

Some information in this report comes from Reuters.

 
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A consortium of U.S. states announced on Wednesday a joint investigation into TikTok’s possible harm to young users of the platform, which has boomed in popularity, especially among children. 

Officials across the United States have launched their own investigations and lawsuits against Big Tech giants as new national regulations have failed to pass, partly because of partisan gridlock in Congress. 

The consortium of eight states will look into the harm TikTok can cause to its young users and what the company knew about such possible harm, California Attorney General Rob Bonta said a statement.  

Leading the investigation is a coalition of attorneys general from California, Florida, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, Tennessee and Vermont.

The investigation will focus, among other things, on TikTok’s techniques to boost young user engagement, including efforts to increase the frequency and duration of children’s use. 

“We don’t know what social media companies knew about these harms and when,” Bonta said in a statement.  

“Our nationwide investigation will allow us to get much-needed answers and determine if TikTok is violating the law in promoting its platform to young Californians,” he added. 

TikTok’s short-form videos have boomed in popularity with the youngest users, prompting growing concern from parents over the potential that their children could develop unhealthy use habits or be exposed to harmful content. 

TikTok welcomes investigation

The platform welcomed the investigation as a chance to provide information on its efforts to protect users. 

“We care deeply about building an experience that helps to protect and support the well-being of our community,” TikTok’s statement said. 

“We look forward to providing information on the many safety and privacy protections we have for teens,” it added. 

Social media’s impact on young users came under renewed scrutiny last year when Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen leaked a trove of internal company documents raising questions over whether it had prioritized growth over users’ safety. 

The documents were given to lawmakers, a consortium of journalists and U.S. regulators by Haugen, who has become a figurehead of criticism of the leading social media platform. 

Despite media attention on the issue and hearings before U.S. lawmakers, no new rules have gotten close to being enacted on the national level. 

States have instead proceeded with their own efforts to look into Big Tech companies. 

For example, a consortium of U.S. states announced a joint probe in November of Instagram’s parent company, Meta, for promoting the app to children despite allegedly knowing its potential for harm. The consortium of attorneys general, states’ top law enforcers and legal advisers, included some of the same states as Wednesday’s probe, like California and Florida.

Instagram sparked fierce criticism for its plans to make a version of the photo-sharing app for younger users. It later halted development. 
…

Some of America’s best-known companies including Apple, Google, Ford, Harley-Davidson and Exxon Mobil rebuked and rejected Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, under steady pressure from investors and consumers decrying the violence. 

Late Tuesday, Apple said it had stopped sales of iPhones and other products in Russia, adding that it was making changes to its Maps app to protect civilians in Ukraine. 

Tech firms including Alphabet’s Google dropped Russian state publishers from their news, and Ford Motor, with three joint venture factories in Russia, told its Russian manufacturing partner it was suspending operations in the country. Motorcycle maker Harley-Davidson suspended shipments of its bikes. 

Exxon wants out of Russia

Exxon Mobil Corp said it would discontinue operations in Russia and was taking steps to exit the Sakhalin-1 venture, following in the steps of British energy giants Shell and BP, Russia’s biggest foreign investor. 

Many corporations have been unusually clear in their condemnation of Russia. 

“We are deeply concerned about the Russian invasion of Ukraine and stand with all of the people who are suffering as a result of the violence,” Apple said in a statement. 

The steady drum beat of companies taking a stance increased later in the day as rockets struck major cities in Ukraine. 

“Ford is deeply concerned about the invasion of Ukraine and the resultant threats to peace and stability. The situation has compelled us to reassess our operations in Russia,” Ford said, adding to several days of announcements by global car companies. 

“We deplore Russia’s military action that violates the territorial integrity of Ukraine and endangers its people,” said Exxon, adding it will not invest in new developments in Russia. 

Boeing suspends support program

Boeing suspended parts, maintenance and technical support services for Russian airlines, a Politico reporter tweeted. The U.S. planemaker suspended major operations in Moscow and will also temporarily closed office in Kyiv, the tweet said. Boeing did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Restrictions from the West have hit the Russian economy hard, with the ruble falling as much as a third to a record low. Financial isolation is rising as shipping companies say they will not serve Russian ports. 

The U.S. government is expected to ban Russian flights from American airspace as soon as Wednesday, government and industry officials told Reuters. 

And a boom of investor interest in environmental, social and governance (ESG) factors is making it more difficult for those companies that sit on the sidelines. 

Russian companies are in particular peril with such Western investors, since they often are not open to talks to change their behavior, said TJ Kistner, vice president at Segal Marco Advisors, a large U.S. pension consultant. 

Investors continue to leave

Western investors may respond by pulling out. 

“The only course of action for many is simply divestment,” Kistner said. 

Moscow has responded by temporarily curbing foreign investors from selling Russian assets. 

Big Tech companies also are continuing efforts to stop Russian forces from taking advantage of their products. 

Apple said it had blocked app downloads of some state-backed news services outside of Russia. 

Microsoft earlier said it would remove Russian state-owned media outlet RT’s mobile apps from its Windows App store and ban ads on Russian state-sponsored media. Google barred RT and other Russian channels from receiving money for ads on websites, apps and YouTube videos, similar to a move by Facebook. 
…

Avalanche forecasters use a slew of technology to predict avalanche risk and help lovers of backcountry winter sports to be prepared. From Boulder Colorado, Shelley Schlender reports. Video editors – Shelley Schlender, Luis Da Costa.
…

Twitter announced Monday that it will start labeling and making it harder for users to see tweets about the invasion of Ukraine that contain information from Russian state media outlets like RT and Sputnik.

“For years we’ve provided more context about state-affiliated media while not accepting ad $ or amplifying accounts,” Twitter said in a tweet. “With many looking for credible info due to the conflict in Ukraine, we’re now adding labels on Tweets linking to state media & reducing the content’s visibility.”

Twitter said it had seen over 45,000 tweets a day from people sharing links to Russian state media, much more than coming from state-sponsored accounts.

Twitter began to de-amplify Russian state media accounts in 2020 and had earlier banned Russian state media from advertising.

The announcement Monday will impact individuals sharing links from those entities.

The move is the latest spat between U.S. social media companies and Russia.

Twitter has been slowed down in Russia several times, most recently on Saturday, and last week, Russia said it would limit Russians’ access to some features of Facebook, saying the company was involved in censorship.

Google and Facebook have also banned Russian state media from monetizing their accounts.

Some information in this report comes from Reuters.
…

YouTube on Saturday barred Russian state-owned media outlet RT and other Russian channels from receiving money for advertisements that run with their videos, similar to a move by Facebook, after the invasion of Ukraine.

Citing “extraordinary circumstances,” YouTube said in a statement that it was “pausing a number of channels’ ability to monetize on YouTube, including several Russian channels affiliated with recent sanctions.” Ad placement is largely controlled by YouTube.

Videos from the affected channels also will come up less often in recommendations, YouTube spokesperson Farshad Shadloo said. He added that RT and several other channels would no longer be accessible in Ukraine due to “a government request.”

Ukraine Digital Minister Mykhailo Fedorov tweeted earlier on Saturday that he contacted YouTube “to block the propagandist Russian channels such as Russia 24, TASS, RIA Novosti.”

RT did not immediately respond to a request for comment. YouTube did not name the other channels it had restricted.

For years, lawmakers and some users have called on YouTube, which is owned by Alphabet Inc’s Google, to take greater action against channels with ties to the Russian government out of concern that they spread misinformation and should not profit from that.

Russia received an estimated $7 million to $32 million over the two-year period ended December 2018 from ads across 26 YouTube channels it backed, digital researcher Omelas told Reuters at the time.

YouTube previously has said that it does not treat state-funded media channels that comply with its rules any differently than other channels when it comes to sharing ad revenue.

Meta Platforms Inc, owner of Facebook, on Friday barred Russian state media from running ads or generating revenue from ads on its services anywhere in the world.
…

The Biden administration announced on Tuesday actions taken by the federal government and private industry that it says will bolster the supply chain of rare earths and other critical minerals used in technologies from household appliances and electronics to defense systems. They say these steps will reduce the nation’s dependence on China, a major producer of these elements. White House Bureau Chief Patsy Widakuswara has this report.
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U.S. auto safety regulators have launched another investigation of Tesla, this time tied to complaints that its cars can come to a stop for no apparent reason.  

The government says it has 354 complaints from owners during the past nine months about “phantom braking” in Tesla Models 3 and Y. The probe covers an estimated 416,000 vehicles from the 2021 and 2022 model years.  

No crashes or injuries were reported. 

The vehicles are equipped with partially automated driver-assist features, such as adaptive cruise control and “Autopilot,” which allow them to automatically brake and steer within their lanes. 

Documents posted Thursday by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration say the vehicles can unexpectedly brake at highway speeds.  

“Complainants report that the rapid deceleration can occur without warning, and often repeatedly during a single drive cycle,” the agency said. 

Many owners in the complaints say they feared a rear-end crash on a freeway. 

The probe is another enforcement effort by the agency that include Autopilot and “Full Self-Driving” software. Despite their names, neither feature can legally drive the vehicles without people supervising. 

Messages were left Thursday seeking comment from Tesla. 

It’s the fourth formal investigation of the Texas automaker in the past three years, and NHTSA is supervising 15 Tesla recalls since January 2021. In addition, the agency has sent investigators to at least 33 crashes involving Teslas using driver-assist systems since 2016 in which 11 people were killed. 

In one of the complaints, a Tesla owner from Austin, Texas, reported that a Model Y on Autopilot brakes repeatedly for no reason on two-lane roads and freeways. 

“The phantom braking varies from a minor throttle response to decrease speed to full emergency braking that drastically reduces the speed at a rapid pace, resulting in unsafe driving conditions for occupants of my vehicle as well as those who might be following behind me,” the owner wrote in a complaint filed February 2. People who file complaints are not identified in NHTSA’s public database.  

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has been fighting with U.S. and California government agencies for years, sparring with NHTSA and the Securities and Exchange Commission.  

Last week, NHTSA made Tesla recall nearly 579,000 vehicles in the U.S. because a “Boombox” function can play sounds over an external speaker and obscure audible warnings for pedestrians of an approaching vehicle. Musk, when asked on Twitter why the company agreed to the recall, responded: “The fun police made us do it (sigh).” 

Michael Brooks, acting executive director of the nonprofit Center for Auto Safety, said it’s encouraging to see NHTSA’s enforcement actions “after years of turning the other way,” with Tesla. But he said the company keeps releasing software onto U.S. roads that isn’t tested to make sure it’s safe. 

“A piecemeal investigative approach to each problem that raises its head does not address the larger issue in Tesla’s safety culture — the company’s continued willingness to beta test its technology on the American public while misrepresenting the capabilities of its vehicles,” Brooks wrote in an email Thursday. 

Other recent recalls by Tesla were for “Full Self-Driving” equipped vehicles that were programmed to run stop signs at slow speeds, heating systems that don’t clear windshields quickly enough, seat belt chimes that don’t sound to warn drivers who aren’t buckled up, and to fix a feature that allows movies to play on touch screens while cars are being driven. Those issues were to be fixed with online software updates. 

In August, NHTSA announced a probe of Teslas on Autopilot failing to stop for emergency vehicles parked on roadways. That investigation covers a dozen crashes that killed one person and injured 17 others.  

Thursday’s investigation comes after Tesla recalled nearly 12,000 vehicles in October for a similar phantom braking problem. The company sent out an online software update to fix a glitch with its more sophisticated “Full Self-Driving” software. 

Tesla did a software update in late September that was intended to improve detection of emergency vehicle lights in low-light conditions. 

Selected Tesla drivers have been beta testing the “Full Self-Driving” software on public roads. NHTSA also has asked the company for information about the testing, including a Tesla requirement that testers not disclose information. 

 
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Google said Wednesday it plans to limit tracking and data sharing for users of its Android operating system, which is used by over 2.5 billion people around the world.

The change, which won’t take effect for at least two years, comes in response to growing pressure on tech companies to increase privacy by limiting tracking.

Google, which dominates the online advertising market, currently assigns IDs to each Android device and then collects highly valuable data on users that allows advertisers to target them with ads based on their interests and activities.

Google said it would test alternatives to those IDs or get rid of them entirely.

“These solutions will limit sharing of user data with third parties and operate without cross-app identifiers, including advertising ID,” the company said in a blog post. “We’re also exploring technologies that reduce the potential for covert data collection.”

“Our goal … is to develop effective and privacy-enhancing advertising solutions, where users know their information is protected, and developers and businesses have the tools to succeed on mobile,” Google added.

Google’s move follows Apple’s announcement last year that it would allow users to decide if they wanted to be tracked or not.

Google made $61 billion in advertising revenue in the fourth quarter of 2021, according to The Washington Post.
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A Nigerian rights group has filed a lawsuit to force authorities to publish an agreement reached with Twitter in January to lift a block on the social media company. The rights group says the failure by Nigerian authorities to publish all the details of the agreement raises concerns about citizens’ rights and censorship.

A Nigerian rights group, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP), said this week that authorities ignored its request last month to publish the agreement.

The lawsuit seeks a court order compelling authorities to publish details of the agreement reached with Twitter before the company restored access to the site in Nigeria.

Nigeria suspended Twitter last June for deleting a tweet from President Muhammadu Buhari that threatened regional separatists and referred to the 1960s war in the Biafra region.

Nigerian authorities lifted the ban in January, boasting that its new engagement with the company will create jobs and generate revenue for the country.

But rights groups are concerned the terms of agreement may include clauses that violate the rights of citizens, says Kolawole Oluwadare, a deputy director at SERAP.

“If this agreement has the tendency to impact on the rights of Nigerians to freedom of expression, it’s important that Nigerians have access to the agreement, scrutinize the terms and critique it if necessary, because of the effect it will have on our ability to use Twitter freely,” said Oluwadare. “How are we sure that those terms do not necessarily affect even the rights to privacy? I’m talking about the access of Nigerian government to the data of Nigerians.”

Nigerian authorities are often accused of trying to stifle free speech.

In 2019, lawmakers considered a bill that sought to punish statements on social media deemed to diminish public confidence in the president or government officials. The bill never passed.

This week, Nigerian Information Minister Lai Mohammed criticized Twitter and the Canadian government as having double standards citing the truckers protest against COVID-19 mandates in Canada.

“Twitter actively supported the EndSARS protesters and even raised funds,” said Mohammed. “These are the same entities that are now rushing to distance themselves from the protest in Canada and even denying them the use of their platforms.”

But Amnesty International spokesperson Seun Bakare has this to say: “International human rights laws are clear on standards that even platforms like Twitter and Facebook must uphold,” said Bakare. “They must uphold the fundamental tenets of freedom of expression, and access to information and they must not bend their rules just to please any government at all.”

Under its agreement with Twitter, Nigeria said the company agreed to be legally registered in the country, run a local office, appoint country representatives to interface with authorities, pay taxes and enroll officials in its partner support portals.

It remains unclear if Nigerian officials have the ability to monitor and block prohibited content.

An ECOWAS court of justice is scheduled to rule on SERAP’s lawsuit this week.
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The technology industry has long employed mostly men in technical roles. But a nonprofit group in Seattle, Washington is trying to change that. VOA’s Natasha Mozgovaya reports.
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Several senior members of President Joe Biden’s administration led the charge Thursday for a significant practical expansion of the nationwide use of electric vehicles.

The federal government is “teaming up with states and the private sector to build a nationwide network of EV chargers by 2030 to help create jobs, fight the climate change crisis, and ensure that this game-changing technology is affordable and accessible for every American,” said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg outside the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Transportation.

In the largest investment of its kind, the Biden administration is to distribute $5 billion to begin building up to a half million roadside rapid charging stations across the country for electric cars and trucks.

To rid EV drivers of “range anxiety,” there will be a “seamless network” of charging stations along the nation’s highways, said Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm.

“Most of them will have more than one [charging] port associated with them,” Granholm added.

“The future is electric, and this administration is moving toward it at lightning speed,” she said.

“Soon we’ll be rolling out an additional two and a half billion [dollars] for a new grant program with even more funding for chargers at the community level across the country,” Buttigieg announced.

Most EVs are hampered from driving long distances by the gap between charging stations and the time it takes to recharge their batteries, which have limited range. Most new electric cars can travel about 500 kilometers or less between charging stops, although some models with ranges beyond 800 kilometers are set to come on the market in the next several years.

The federal money being distributed will “help states create a network of EV charging stations along designated Alternative Fuel Corridors, particularly along the Interstate Highway System,” according to the Transportation Department.

It is estimated that nearly $40 billion will need to be spent to build public charging stations to reach the goal of 100% EV sales in the United States by 2035.

Some analysts see a bumpy road toward Biden’s clean energy destination.

“EVs do not necessarily generate lower carbon emissions than gasoline-powered vehicles,” said Jeff Miron, vice president of research at the Cato Institute, a public policy think tank. “The energy needed to charge batteries comes from somewhere, and in some parts of the country, that source tends to be coal, which generates even more carbon than gasoline,” he told VOA.

“Building charging stations will lower the cost of using EVs, which might encourage more driving,” added Miron, who is also a senior lecturer in economics at Harvard University. “More generally, unless an anti-carbon policy raises the price of using carbon-based fuels, it is unlikely to be the most efficient way to reduce carbon emissions.”

To tap the funds, the 50 states must submit an EV Infrastructure Deployment Plan by August 1, with approvals from the federal government to come by the end of the following month.

The federal guidance requests that states explain how they will deliver projects with at least 40% of the benefits going to disadvantaged communities.

The Biden White House has an initiative named “Justice40,” which calls for a minimum of 40% of the federal funds for climate mitigation and clean energy to go to disadvantaged areas.

The initial $5 billion in funds for the public charging stations comes from the $1 trillion infrastructure law. The investment is seen as a significant contribution toward the president’s stated goal of cutting carbon emissions caused by transportation and ensuring half of new cars are electric by 2030.

“We will have to expand both the transmission grid as well as the sources of clean energy that we add to it in order to get to the president’s goal,” acknowledged Granholm.
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As if we didn’t have enough to worry about: Some scientists are warning about the inevitable catastrophic effects on modern life from a super-sized solar storm.

These outbursts from the sun, which eject energy in the form of magnetic fields and billions of tons of plasma gas known as “flares,” are unpredictable and difficult to anticipate.

The Earth suffers a devastating direct hit every century or two, according to recent analysis of scientific data and historic accounts. In the past, these were mainly celestial events with spectacular aurora light shows but scant impact on humanity. Modern technology, however, is vulnerable to the shocks from extreme solar storms.

“It’s not as rare as an asteroid or a comet hitting the Earth, but it’s something that really needs to be dealt with by policymakers,” said Daniel Baker, distinguished professor of planetary and space physics at the University of Colorado. “Certainly, in the longer term, it’s not a question of if but when.”

Astrophysicists estimate the likelihood of a solar storm capable of causing catastrophe to be as high as 12% in a decade.

“It’s just a matter of time,” according to professor Raimund Muscheler, chair of quaternary sciences in the geology department of Lund University in Sweden. “One has to be aware of it and one has to calculate the risks and be prepared as much as possible.”

A new study of ancient ice samples conducted by the Swedish scientist concludes that a previously unknown, huge solar storm about 9,200 years ago would have crippled communications if it had hit Earth in modern times.

“A failure in one kind of sector can propagate through the system and affect a lot of other things, and I think that’s probably the thing that worries me most about storms is that they can be widespread and can have consequences in all kinds of systems that that we might not otherwise think about,” Baker said.

A relatively minor solar storm, that caused a disturbance in the Earth’s magnetic field, is blamed for the loss of as many as 40 of the 49 Starlink internet-access satellites launched February 3 from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

Phases of disturbance

When the sun shoots out energy, it affects Earth in phases. The first occurs here eight minutes after the solar event 150 million kilometers away, the time it takes light to travel from the sun.

The initial trouble occurs on the daylight side of the planet from the early arriving X-rays, which dramatically disrupt the ionosphere — where the Earth’s atmosphere meets space — and radio communications. They also create additional drag on some satellites, degrading their orbits, which is what happened to the Starlink satellites.

In subsequent minutes and hours, highly charged particles unleash a radioactive storm, posing a danger to astronauts in orbit.

The third phase, known as the coronal mass ejection — gas and magnetic field explosions on the surface of the sun — disturbs the planet’s magnetosphere, lighting up the sky and inducing electrical currents on the surface, which can overload power grids and speed corrosion of pipelines.

“The geomagnetic storm can actually cause transformers to burn through if they are not adequately protected,” said Muscheler of Lund University.

The power industry in North America has taken steps in recent years to harden its infrastructure to protect from the dangerous surges. U.S. government agencies have a program to deploy emergency transformers to replace those that would fail.

“Although the U.S. government has estimated the cost of a severe space weather event to be in the billions, this worst-case scenario is typically not considered by most policy planners,” said Sangeetha Abdu Jyothi, assistant professor in the computer science department at the University of California, Irvine. “In short, the risk is well-known, but not always considered during design and planning in most cases.”

Long-distance fiber-optic and submarine telecommunications cables at higher latitudes, where the Earth is more exposed, can also suffer serious damage.

“The U.S. is highly susceptible to disconnection from Europe,” Jyothi wrote in a recent research paper. “Europe is in a vulnerable location but is more resilient due to the presence of a larger number of shorter cables. Asia has relatively high resilience with Singapore acting as a hub with connections to several countries.”

The sun frequently hurls big flares at Earth, but most are not large enough to wreak havoc or don’t strike the planet directly. But, as SpaceX experienced this week, even some of the less severe flares can neutralize satellites.

“The timing is unfortunate for SpaceX,” said Bill Murtagh, program coordinator for the Space Weather Prediction Center of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. He added that the 1,500 SpaceX satellites already in orbit were not affected.

Any major solar storm poses a threat to Global Positioning System satellites, which provide accurate time signals and precise navigation, technology critical in modern life from agriculture to aviation.

A big storm can also trigger ozone depletion, meaning there are possible effects on the terrestrial climate, according to atmospheric scientists.

Previous disruptions

The societal reactions to the solar outbursts of past centuries now seem quaint, although they were sensational events at the time.

When an intense geomagnetic storm hit the Earth in September 1859, known as the Carrington Event, telegraph systems across North America and Europe failed and some operators reported receiving electrical shocks.

A solar storm in March 1989 caused power failures in Quebec, Canada.

The Halloween Storms of 2003 affected more than half of the orbiting satellites, and disrupted aviation for more than a day because planes could not be accurately tracked. Electrical service was also knocked out in parts of Europe for several hours, and transformers in South Africa were permanently damaged.

Since the Carrington Event, state-of-the-art communication has gone from the telegraph to the internet.

“Are we ready for a Carrington class event? No, we still have work to do,” Murtagh of NOAA told VOA.

“While the frequency of climate disasters is increasing gradually, we will be caught by surprise by an extreme solar event that causes significant disruptions. Most people alive today have never experienced an extreme space weather event that has a global impact during our lifetime,” Jyothi of University of California-Irvine told VOA.

She also warned that solar superstorms could cause large-scale internet outages covering the entire globe and lasting several months.

The geomagnetic storms tend to happen more frequently when there are more sunspots (each such freckle on the sun being about the size of Earth). The sun is heading into a new cycle, meaning there is an increasing likelihood of disruptive events as this cycle ramps up to its predicted peak in July 2025.

“We’re going to see more sunspots, more solar flares, more eruptions and consequently more effects on technology here on Earth,” Murtagh said.

Intensity levels

One bit of good news: Solar scientists predict this cycle will be less intense than the most active cycles of past centuries.

Society in the 21st century, however, seems unprepared for the consequences of cascading inter-connected technological failings likely to be caused by future major storms.

“The sun is the giver of life, but it can be cruel too — especially on the technology we rely on for so much of what we do today,” Murtagh said.

Congress passed a bill in 2020 directing the National Science Foundation, NASA and the Defense Department to continue supporting basic research related to space weather.

Some other governments seem less focused on the issue.

Baker recalls a letter he received from a concerned woman in France who contacted officials there for advice on how to prepare for a major geo-magnetic storm.

“We suggest you buy a chocolate cake, eat it and wait for the end of the world,” she was told, according to Baker.
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Media giant News Corp is investigating a cyberattack that has accessed the email and documents of some of its employees and journalists.

On Friday, New York-based News Corp, whose entities include The Wall Street Journal and the New York Post, sent an internal email to staff, stating that it had been the target of “persistent nation-state attack activity.”

“On January 20th, News Corp discovered attack activity on a system used by several of our business units,” David Kline, News Corp chief technology officer, wrote in the email.

News Corp said that as soon as it discovered the attack, it notified law enforcement and launched an investigation with the help of Mandiant, a cybersecurity firm.

The cyberattack affected a “limited number of business email accounts and documents” from News Corp headquarters as well as its News Technology Services, Dow Jones, News UK and New York Post businesses.

“Our preliminary analysis indicates that foreign government involvement may be associated with this activity, and that some data was taken,” Kline wrote. “We will not tolerate attacks on our journalism, nor will we be deterred from our reporting.”

“Mandiant assesses that those behind this activity have a China nexus, and we believe they are likely involved in espionage activities to collect intelligence to benefit China’s interests,” Dave Wong, Mandiant vice president and incident responder, said in an email to VOA.

Wong’s suspicion echoed that of human rights groups, which have also faced an increase in cyberattacks thought to originate from a “foreign government” they also believe is China.

Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in the U.S., told VOA in an email Friday that rather than making allegations based on speculations, he hoped there could be “a professional, responsible and evidence-based approach” to identifying cyberattacks.

“China is a staunch defender of cybersecurity and has long been a main victim of cyberthefts and attacks,” Liu said. “China firmly opposes and combats cyberattacks and cybertheft in all forms.”

Rights groups targeted

Cyberattacks might be used to intimidate those who are critical of the Chinese government, according to Peter Irwin, senior program officer for advocacy and communications at Uyghur Human Rights Project (UHRP) in Washington.

“They might want journalists to think twice before they continue to do critical work uncovering issues in the country,” Irwin told VOA, adding that his organization had also seen a major spike in cyberattacks believed to be from China in recent weeks, targeting its website and staff email.

Uyghur rights groups such as UHRP have been calling for a boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics on social media, using the hashtag #GenocideGames and citing allegations of human rights abuses of Uyghurs and other Turkic ethnic groups in Xinjiang, where China has been accused of arbitrarily detaining more than 1 million people in internment camps.

On Tuesday, The Wall Street Journal reported that pro-China accounts had flooded Twitter messages with the #GenocideGames hashtag. Hashtag flooding is the act of hijacking a hashtag on social media platforms to dilute or change its meaning.

In early December, the U.S. announced a diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympics, citing China’s “ongoing genocide and crimes against humanity in Xinjiang and other human rights abuses.”

Beijing denies accusations of mass detention and says that all ethnic groups in Xinjiang “live in together in harmony” and experience “healthy and balanced development.”

Tahir Imin, a Uyghur activist and founder of the Washington-based Uyghur Times, says his news organization has long been the target of cyberattacks he believes are coming from China.

Volexity, a Washington-based cybersecurity firm, stated in a September 2019 blog post that “cyberspace has become a battleground for the Uyghur people. The level of surveillance occurring in China against Uyghurs extends well beyond their borders and has fully entered the digital realm.”

“Recently, especially starting from January 10, 2022, we have seen more cyberattacks by unknown hackers aimed at the main index of English and Chinese websites of Uyghur Times,” Imin told VOA, adding that his organization’s email server had also been the target of similar attacks.

FBI assessment

In a speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum in California, FBI Director Christopher Wray said that in the U.S., Beijing had unleashed “a massive, sophisticated hacking program that is bigger than those of every other major nation combined.”

“They’re not just hacking on a huge scale but causing indiscriminate damage to get to what they want,” Wray said. “Like in the recent Microsoft Exchange hack, which compromised the networks of more than 10,000 American companies in a single campaign alone.”

According to Salih Hudayar, president and founder of the East Turkistan National Awakening Movement, a Washington-based Uyghur independence advocacy group, his group’s website has seen a “severe increase” in cyberattacks in recent weeks, especially since the beginning of the Beijing Winter Games.

“It seems, on average, in the past 24 hours (per hour), we had over 15 million attacks against our website,” Hudayar told VOA, adding that most of the attacks were originating from Singapore.

He said he believed Singapore was being used “to mask the true location” of the origin of the attacks. “We definitely think China is behind this attack,” Hudayar said.
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At the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, China is using technology to keep athletes and visitors safe as part of its pandemic precautions. But for visitors, the use of technology can come with security and privacy concerns. Michelle Quinn reports. Carolyn Presutti contributed.
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More than a decade ago, technology giant Apple began telling its smartphone customers that if something was worth doing, “There’s an app for that.”

Starting now, the same can be said of fighting terrorism.

The U.S. National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) Monday launched its aCTknowledge mobile app, ready for download from the Apple app store and from the NCTC website.

“The app is a one stop shop to get unclassified counterterrorism information,” a NCTC official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity in order to discuss the center’s foray into mobile apps.

Officials said a version should also be available in the coming months from Google Play, and that the information will also be available in a desktop version. 

But while the app is public, access to the full suite of features is limited to counterterrorism professionals.

NCTC officials say the initial rollout is limited to officials with the U.S. federal government and in the U.S. military.  State and local counterterrorism officials will also be getting access in the near future.

“This is a tremendous evolution of our information sharing efforts,” a NCTC expert who helped develop the aCTknowledge app told reporters.

“We’re moving from a weekly, regularized information sharing effort (via email) to a daily, near real time effort,” the expert said. “Our ability to send push notifications to partners using the app is really going to change the community, in general, because we’ll be able to immediately level-set everyone’s understanding of a counterterrorism event as it occurs.”

Like other apps, NCTC’s aCTknowledge will enable users to get notifications, search for information and follow for updates on specific terms or topics.

NCTC says the nature of the new mobile app will also allow it to see what type of information its various government partners are looking for, and make sure that data or training is made available.

Although the information being shared on the app is unclassified, officials are taking precautions to protect the systems from hackers and others who might try to misuse it.

“You’re required to use your official government email address to register,” a second NCTC expert said, speaking like the other on the condition of anonymity. “And then we have an established vetting criteria to make sure that applicants have a validated need to know.”

Officials say many of the app’s features were designed with the help of state and local first responders, including police and fire departments from across the United States.

“With the release of aCTknowledge, NCTC is delivering on our mission to innovate how we share intelligence products with our partners,” NCTC Director Christy Abizaid said in a statement late Monday. “The app empowers its users with the information they need to protect their communities from potential threats.” 
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News Corp disclosed on Friday it was the target of a cyberattack that accessed data of some employees, with its internet security adviser saying the hack was likely aimed at gathering “intelligence to benefit China’s interests.”

The publisher of the Wall Street Journal said the breach, discovered in late January, accessed emails and documents of a limited number of employees, including journalists, but added that cybersecurity firm Mandiant had contained the attack.

“Mandiant assesses that those behind this activity have a China nexus, and we believe they are likely involved in espionage activities to collect intelligence to benefit China’s interests,” David Wong, vice president of consulting at Mandiant, told Reuters.

The Chinese Embassy in the United States did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“Although we are in the early stages of our investigation, we believe the activity affected a limited number of business email accounts and documents from News Corp headquarters, News Technology Services, Dow Jones, News UK, and New York Post,” company executives wrote in a letter to employees, seen by Reuters.

“Our preliminary analysis indicates that foreign government involvement may be associated with this activity, and that some data was taken.”

The company added that its other business units, including HarperCollins Publishers, Move, News Corp Australia, Foxtel, REA, and Storyful, were not targeted in the attack.

The Wall Street Journal, which reported the news first, competes with Reuters, the news division of Thomson Reuters Corp , in supplying news to media outlets.

 
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