Digital Discourse Database

Number of Posts: 95
Posts 21 - 30

Facebook uses AI to help blind people 'see' the site: Feature uses audio and image recognition to describe scenes in photos

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Newspaper | Mail Online
Date | 5.4.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Facebook
Summary | Facebook introduced Automatic Alternative Text; it uses artificial intelligence to help blind people "see" posts. Automatic Alternative Text uses 'neural network' to recognize specific items in photos using millions of examples.
Image Description | Photograph of three smartphone screens displaying Facebook posts, photograph of two hands holding a smartphone, and screenshot of an iPhone's "accessibility" functions
Image Tags | Facebook, hand(s), smartphone

Munich shooter's meticulous planning revealed: Teenager researched shooting sprees and even hacked into a Facebook account to lure children to McDonald's before murdering nine

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Newspaper | Mail Online
Date | 23.7.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, threat, youth
Summary | Munich killer created a fake Facebook account to lure children to the McDonald massacre. Sonobly spent months planning his murder; he was obsessed with mass murders. For instance, his Whatsapp profile picture was a picture of Anders Breivik, the Norwegian mass murderer. Sonobly hacked Selina Akim's Facebook account and posted a message saying that there would be free food at the McDonald's restaurant near the Olympic stadium at 4pm.
Image Description | Photograph of the fake Facebook account, portrait of the killer, and several pictures of the massacre site.
Image Tags | Facebook, female(s), male(s)

In the Apple Case, a Debate Over Data Hits Home

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 13.3.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Facebook, law, politics, privacy, research/study, smartphone, threat
Summary | Apple's refusal to aide the FBI with breaking into the phone of the San Bernardino attacker has unleashed a political debate among Americans. IT experts as well as lay people report that they have had discussions about the topic with other people, some say they have had fights over Facebook with family members about the issue. Polls show that the American people are hugely divided on the topic: 42% think Apple should cooperate with the FBI while 47% support Apple's stance to protect user privacy.
Image Description | Getty image of a protest crowd showing a man holding up his smartphone with the text: "Don't turn our phones into FBI drones".
Image Tags | female(s), male(s), smartphone, text

Merkel says big internet firms 'distort perception': Chancellor demands Facebook and Google make their algorithms public

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Newspaper | Mail Online
Date | 28.10.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, Google, marketing, politics, privacy
Summary | Merkel wants Facebook and Google to be more transparent and reveal the algorithms that select stories people see. She claimed that those algorithms distort our perception of reality. Internet giants don't agree with that; they said that viewers have access to a wide range of opinions.
Image Description | Photograph of Angela Merket speaking at a conference, photograph of the Facebook logo with the reaction buttons, and Twitter logo.
Image Tags | Facebook, female(s), logo, Twitter

Facebook backs down in race row: Will stop advertisers using 'ethnic affinity' to target housing, employment and credit ads

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Newspaper | Mail Online
Date | 11.11.2016
Language | English
Country | UK
Topic Tags | Facebook, marketing, privacy
Summary | Facebook will stop its "ethnic affinity" practice that helps advertisers reach ethnic groups with housing, extension of credit, and employment ads. However, policymakers and civil rights leaders have been concerned about the use of the ethnic affinity option; those ads discriminate against people. The privacy and public policy manager at Facebook said that it is important to keep the option to include and exclude groups for advertisers.
Image Description | Screenshot of Facebook's 'Detailed Targeting' form, screenshot of a part of a Facebook page, photograph of a smartphone screen with social media logos on it
Image Tags | Facebook, logo, smartphone, social media

Tech industry slowly rallies behind Apple in iPhone fight

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Newspaper | USA Today
Date | 19.2.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Facebook, Google, law, privacy, smartphone, threat
Summary | The FBI had issues a court order to Apple to hack into the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino terrorists. When Apple declined, other tech magnates like Google and Facebook sided with them saying that tech companies cannot be ordered to compromise their customers' privacy by the governement. Allowing this to happen now would set a problematic precedent for the future.
Image Description | Portrait of Mark Zuckerberg.
Image Tags | Facebook, male(s)

Siri, Alexa and Other Virtual Assistants Put to the Test

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 27.1.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, Facebook, Google
Summary | The five major tech companies now all offer artificial intelligence assistants: Apple with Siri, Microsoft with Cortana, Amazon with Alexa, Facebook with M, and Google. They were all put to the test with a few tasks: find out who is playing in the upcoming Super Bowl, play some music, schedule something one's calendar, book a flight, find out about the traffic situation, and find nearby restaurants and order food. None of the AI assistants did perfectly with the highest score of 3.1 out of 4.0 going to Google.
Image Description | Drawing of the five AI assistants as little robots with name tags and their overall score.
Image Tags | Facebook, Google

Blind Facebook users 'see' photos

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Newspaper | USA Today
Date | 5.4.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | artificial intelligence, diversity, Facebook, Instagram
Summary | Facebook has a new function that is meant to make the predominantly visual platforms of Facebook and Instagram more inclusive to people with visual impairments. The new software uses artificial intelligence to tell blind users what is in the images. It is not perfect yet but the image recognition can identify simple things like specific sports, etc.
Image Description | Screenshots of Facebook feeds with the image content captioned.
Image Tags | Facebook

WhatsApp Introduces End-to-End Encryption

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 5.4.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Facebook, law, privacy, threat, WhatsApp
Summary | Facebook has introduced end-to-end encryption for all WhatsApp communication including one-on-one and group chats and multimedia data sent in chats. This is a step to protect user privacy because breaches have happened in the past. The federal government however opposes this step because it denies the police access to communications which may be crucial to crack criminal cases.
Image Description | WhatsApp and Facebook logos.
Image Tags | Facebook, logo, WhatsApp

Facebook Groups Act as Weapons Bazaars for Militias

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Newspaper | The New York Times
Date | 6.4.2016
Language | English
Country | U.S.
Topic Tags | Facebook, law, marketing, threat
Summary | Since Facebook has enabled the transmission of payments via the site, it has seen an increase of commerce on the platform. Most worryingly, many Middle Eastern Facebook group pages advertise and apparently sell fire arms (everything from pistols over machine guns to missiles) via Facebook. Facebook has forbidden the sale of fire arms on their platform but they have to rely on users to report such cases.
Image Description | Images of the weapons on sale on Facebook, ISIS fighters, and refugee boats.
Image Tags | Facebook, male(s)

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