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Dorsey, the co-founder of Twitter and the head of Block Inc, has previously supported unconventional Democratic candidates.
10 months ago
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Nawfal, who has rapidly gained online fame and been boosted by Elon Musk, denied any wrongdoing.
9 months ago
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A doctored White House news release posted online falsely claimed that the Biden administration had authorized $8 billion in emergency aid to Israel on Saturday. The fact that it was faked didn’t stop it from being posted across the internet and rising to the top of Google search results. The faked document is one of the most far-reaching instances of misinformation to come out of the most recent violent conflict between Hamas and Israel. It fooled several online publications into writing full a…
6 months ago
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Meta’s WhatsApp messaging company says that forwarded messages stoking fears about potential cyberattacks targeting Jewish people have no basis in reality. The warnings appear to have begun circulating Saturday on numerous online platforms. On Saturday evening, crypto influencer Scott Melker, who has almost 1 million followers on X, posted the warning asking that people share it. The warning says that hackers will try to get people to download a file through WhatsApp called “Seismic Waves CARD”…
6 months ago
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The community fact-checking feature that Elon Musk has touted as a way to fight false and misleading information on X is struggling to keep up with a flood of content related to the Israel-Hamas war. The system, Community Notes, relies on approved volunteers to suggest notes to be appended to posts. Those posts are then voted on by other volunteers and eventually published after they reach a certain threshold of “helpful” votes from “people with different points of view,” according to X. The not…
6 months ago
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A human rights watchdog group said Thursday that Israel’s military has used white phosphorus munitions in recent days in Gaza and Lebanon, weapons that can cause severe burns and are considered particularly dangerous for civilians due to their indiscriminate nature. Human Rights Watch said that videos recorded in Lebanon and Gaza on Tuesday and Wednesday showed airdropped white phosphorus artillery rounds — an assessment that was vehemently denied by Israeli officials. Human Rights Watch said th…
6 months ago
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Ella Irwin wasn’t always a public person. Before joining Twitter, she had worked in lower-profile roles, including in loss prevention at banks and then in trust and safety at companies like Google, Amazon and Twilio. That all changed in November 2022. Just five months after joining the company, she took on one of the most contentious jobs in all of tech: head of trust and safety for Twitter. She would last just seven more months. In June, Irwin resigned from the company after Musk publicly crit…
5 months ago
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U.S. Border Patrol officials received no official requests and little warning ahead of Elon Musk’s highly publicized Sept. 28 visit to the U.S.-Mexico border, according to emails obtained by NBC News. The emails, acquired through a Freedom of Information Act request, show government officials discussing and briefing each other on the visit, in which Musk appeared in a cowboy hat at the border site near Eagle Pass, Texas, with Rep. Tony Gonzales, R-Texas. The two discussed immigration as Musk bro…
5 months ago
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As advertisers continue to back away from X following concerns around antisemitism on the platform, tech billionaire Elon Musk and his supporters are digging in their heels. In the past six days, Musk has launched a lawsuit against a progressive watchdog organization, engaged with long-debunked conspiracy theories about a pizza shop and boasted about a graveyard of his enemies. Meanwhile, conservative politicians and influencers have rallied to his side with kind posts to his social media platf…
4 months ago
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The leaders of X, Meta, Snap, TikTok and Discord have been called to testify before a Senate Judiciary hearing about online child sexual exploitation. Sens. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said Monday that they had issued subpoenas to the CEOs of X, Discord and Snap. The senators said they expected Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew to testify voluntarily, based on conversations they said had been occurring between committee members and the companies. In a join…
4 months ago
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Elon Musk continued to boost a debunked conspiracy theory Tuesday, posting and later deleting a meme on X that referred to a fringe, far-right claim that sought to connect members of the Democratic Party with child abuse. Musk wrote “does seem at least a little suspicious” alongside a meme drawing from the TV show “The Office,” which included fake dialogue superimposed on images of a character arguing that “Pizzagate is real,” a reference to a conspiracy theory that gained traction in 2016 and…
4 months ago
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In February 2014, Airbnb made a commitment: The company would require hosts to confirm that carbon monoxide detectors were installed in every listing by the end of the year. Months earlier, the short-term rental company faced one of its first reported deaths involving carbon monoxide: a Canadian citizen staying in an Airbnb in Taiwan. The company wanted to do more, it said in a now-deleted blog post. “By the end of 2014, we’ll require all Airbnb hosts to confirm that they have these devices ins…
4 months ago
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Meta said Wednesday that end-to-end encryption would now be the default setting for messages and calls on Messenger and Facebook, two of the most widely used apps on the internet. The technology, which uses cryptography to add a layer of security to digital communications, has been widely promoted and lauded by security experts, who have said that it can prevent intrusions like unlawful surveillance and certain types of hacking. But child safety groups and certain law enforcement organizations a…
4 months ago
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A feature meant to give Instagram users control over how Meta’s fact-checking process affects their feeds is sparking backlash and speculation after the company rolled it out quietly with little explanation. In an update Tuesday to a blog post originally published in July, Meta said Instagram had recently added new user controls to its “Fact-Checked Control program.” “The Fact-Checked Control allows you to choose how fact-checked content that we usually reduce, appears in your feed from accounts…
4 months ago
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The Iowa gunman who opened fire on Perry High School last week appeared to have an active account on the internet chat platform Discord where he previously discussed school shootings and described “gearing up” moments before Thursday’s attack, NBC News has learned. Dylan Butler, 17, killed sixth grader Ahmir Jolliff, 11, and injured four other students and three staff members, including principal Dan Marburger, before he died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Police said they also found an imp…
3 months ago
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Ella Irwin, Elon Musk’s former head of trust and safety at X, has found a new post at Stability AI, the company that’s largely taken credit for the development of the text-to-image generation model called Stable Diffusion. Irwin joined the company in the second half of December as its senior vice president of integrity, NBC News has learned. Irwin led X’s trust and safety work during what appeared to be some of the company’s most tumultuous and controversial periods. At Stability AI, she will o…
3 months ago
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WASHINGTON — Tech CEOs are set to testify Wednesday at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing about child safety issues on social media platforms and will offer rare policy commitments and regulatory endorsements, company representatives said. The hearing, which has attracted significant attention in the tech industry and Washington, will bring together the CEOs of X, TikTok, Discord, Meta and Snap to address concerns and questions about how platforms are considering their impact on children. Suc…
about 2 months ago
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Wizz, a social media app growing popular among teens in the U.S., was removed from the Apple app store and Google Play this week. Apple removed the app Tuesday after the National Center on Sexual Exploitation contacted the company with concerns about the alleged use of Wizz in sextortion scams, according to a series of emails reviewed by NBC News. In an email from an Apple representative in response to the center, a representative wrote, “We take App Store violations seriously and appreciate you…
about 2 months ago
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Canada’s watchdog for child exploitation issued a warning to parents Tuesday about Wizz, a Tinder-like app for teens, after it reappeared in Apple’s app store. Cybertip.ca, the tip line run by the Canadian Centre for Child Protection, known as C3P, published a release telling parents that they should consider removing Wizz from their children’s phones. The organization, which is designated by Canada’s government to collect information about allegations of child sexual exploitation, said that it…
about 1 month ago
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NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Jack Posobiec set off a wave of alarm after a video of his welcome speech at this year’s Conservative Political Action Conference went viral. In the video, the right-wing activist and media personality said he wanted to end democracy and finish the mission of Jan. 6, installing a God-first government. “Welcome to the end of democracy. We are here to overthrow it completely,” he said Thursday. “We didn’t get all the way there on Jan. 6, but we will endeavor to get rid of i…
about 1 month ago
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NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Nazis appeared to find a friendly reception at the Conservative Political Action Conference this year. Throughout the conference, racist extremists, some of whom had secured official CPAC badges, openly mingled with conference attendees and espoused antisemitic conspiracy theories. The presence of these individuals has been a persistent issue at CPAC. In previous years, conference organizers have ejected well-known Nazis and white supremacists such as Nick Fuentes. But thi…
about 1 month ago