In an apparent global system outage, WhatsApp users have been shut out from sending or receiving messages on Thursday afternoon. As of 2:10pm ET the worst-hit are Brazil, the Netherlands, the US, the UK, Switzerland, Italy, India, and the Middle East.
On Downdetector.com reports started spiking after 1:20pm ET with a peak of 3250 reports at 2pm ET.
While online spending surged, the overall picture for Thanksgiving weekend spending was more mixed as the traditional “bricks and mortar” retailers continued to struggle. Nevertheless, overall spending was about 4% higher. The National Retail Foundation (NRF) estimated that 174 million Americans shopped online or in stores over the period (Thursday to Monday), versus 164 million the previous year, although the latter excluded Cyber Monday. According to Bloomberg.
Authored by Derrick Broze via ActivistPost.com,
In one of the most important Fourth Amendment battles of the digital age, the Supreme Court is preparing to tackle a case involving law enforcement accessing cellphone records without a warrant.
Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,
Check the context before uncritically accepting sensationalist conclusions.
Let's start with a primer on how to write a sensationalist story that can be passed off as "journalism:"
1. Locate credible-sounding data that can be de-contextualized, i.e. sensationalized.
2. Present the data as "fact" rather than data that requires verification by disinterested researchers.
A mere few years ago the idea that artificial intelligence (AI) might be used to analyze and report to law enforcement aberrant human behavior on social media and other online platforms was merely the far out premise of dystopian movies such as Minority Report, but now Facebook proudly brags that it will use AI to "save lives" based on behavior and thought pattern recognition.
What could go wrong?