Facebook deletes 652 fake accounts and pages targeting world politics

According to Facebook, some of the fake Pages, groups and accounts originated in Iran and some in Russia.

International News: Facebook has removed 652 fake accounts for "coordinated inauthentic behavior" that originated in Iran and Russia and targeted people across multiple Internet services in the Middle East, Latin America, Britain and the US.

According to Facebook, some of the fake Pages, groups and accounts originated in Iran and some in Russia.

These sanctions allow companies to provide people Internet services for personal communications, including the government and its affiliates.

"But Facebook takes steps to prevent people in Iran and other sanctioned countries from using our ad tools," said Gleicher.

Also Read: Whatsapp Fake News Controversy

Facebook also removed Pages, groups and accounts that can be linked to sources the US government has previously identified as Russian military intelligence services.

"While these are some of the same bad actors we removed for cybersecurity attacks before the 2016 US election, this more recent activity focused on politics in Syria and Ukraine," Facebook said.

For example, these accounts are associated with Inside Syria Media Centre, which the Atlantic Council and other organisations have identified for covertly spreading pro-Russian and pro-Assad content.

Read Full Story → Facebook Deletes Fake Accounts

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News Source: BS

 

WhatsApp to trace the origin of fake messages, set up servers in India

The instant messaging platform had earlier expressed inability in tracing the origin of messages citing privacy of consumers.

Fake News Controversy: With the government threatening action against WhatsApp over spread of fake news, the chief executive officer (CEO) of the American messaging platform, Chris Daniels, flew down to New Delhi to fix things.

Daniels, who took over as the boss of WhatsApp in May, on Tuesday told the government it would work out a technological solution to trace the origin of fake messages. The Facebook-owned firm, with more than 200 million active subscribers in India, also committed to complying with the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) rules relating to local storage of financial data by having servers in India.

Daniels, a Facebook insider known for running internet.org at the California-based social media firm, has been firefighting with the Indian authorities over fake news soon after he was appointed as the WhatsApp boss.

Whatsapp Fake News Measures

Following an exchange of letters with the Department of Information Technology on the steps to block fake news, the WhatsApp team decided to meet the authorities in person to list out the corrective measures planned by the company. In the country for three to four days, the team would meet other ministers and bureaucrats as well. It could not be confirmed if a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi was scheduled.

Within hours of his interaction with Daniels, Electronics and Information Technology Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad was off to Argentina for an ICT conference. From there, he will travel to Silicon Valley, which houses several prominent tech companies including WhatsApp. The minister is scheduled to meet top executives of many tech companies including Google during his...continue reading

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News Source: BS

Fake News Menace: You can share WhatsApp messages with only up to 5 people

The Facebook-owned instant messaging service is also reportedly testing more features to crack down on fake news on its platform.

Technology News: In response to the government's crackdown on the circulation of fake news, especially using its platform, WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned instant messaging mobile app, has limit the number of people to whom you can forward a message to five.

The move follows several other steps with the same objective, such as issuing guidelines on how to identify forwarded messages and be a responsible user of the service.

The new feature would roll out as part of an app update from this week itself. The step came soon after the government asked WhatsApp and other social media platforms to take onus and help curb fake news circulation, which had been causing violence -- even lynching in some recent cases.

WhatsApp Forward Messages

WhatsApp has also reportedly been testing more features to crack down on fake news on its platform. Recently, the company had started testing a feature in its beta app for Android in which the app recognises authenticity of the link and marks unusual links as ‘suspicious’.

“Spammers may use some character combinations to trick you into tapping on links that appear to go to a legitimate website, but actually take you to a malicious site,” the company said in a statement.

The statement further added that these checks on links happen only on the user device because of end-to-end encryption which does not allow the company to see the content of messages. This also implies that WhatsApp will not be able to stop a malicious link from being forwarded, but can only label it as suspicious once it has…continue reading

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News Source : BS

New update allows users to access Instagram and Facebook content within WhatsApp

In its latest update rolled out for select iOS users, WhatsApp support will allow users to play Instagram and Facebook videos within the app, without exiting the chat.

Technology News : In a bid to increase user engagement, popular instant messaging platform, WhatsApp, has rolled out an update by which users can view content from Facebook and Instagram within the app itself.

In the present day, a user who receives videos or images from Facebook, Instagram or any such app would be redirected to these apps to view the content. However, this is set to change with the new update, reports The Verge.

In its latest update rolled out for select iOS users, WhatsApp support will allow users to play Instagram and Facebook videos within the app, without exiting the chat.

Apart from this, the new update also introduces the ability to add and revoke admin privileges from users in a group chat and empowers admins to edit the subject, description and icon of a chat that is already underway.

In November last year, WhatsApp had announced an update through which one can view YouTube videos directly inside the messaging app, in picture-in-picture mode.

If a YouTube link has been sent on a conversation, then users can directly view the video through the link on WhatsApp itself, as it will no longer be redirected to YouTube. Instead, the YouTube clip will appear within a small floating window on your screen, thus implying that you can watch YouTube videos and message at the same time.

On a related note, the latest update is expected to be rolled out to Android users as well in the coming weeks.

Read More about the Latest → WhatsApp Update

Blackberry, VoxSmart partner to enable banks to monitor WhatsApp chats

Firms partnered to help financial corps comply with EU's Markets in Financial Instruments Directive

To enable financial institutions to monitor data on WhatsApp Chat and other encrypted messaging platforms in line with the upcoming European Union (EU) directive, BlackBerry has partnered with the leading mobile surveillance and compliance firm VoxSmart.

Together with BlackBerry UEM (Unified Endpoint Management), which connects and manages endpoints, VoxSmart's 'VSmart' will provide financial services firms with the ability to capture, record, store and analyse mobile voice, text and third-party instant messaging applications such as WhatsApp and WeChat.

"Together with VoxSmart, we can enable businesses around the world to effortlessly capture conversations on endpoints including smartphones, wearables, tablets and laptops," said Florian Bienvenu, Senior Vice President of EMEA Sales, BlackBerry.

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"This joint solution is an excellent example of how BlackBerry is leveraging its software portfolio and developing strong partnerships to secure the Enterprise of Things," Bienvenu added in a statement.
The companies have partnered to help financial services firms comply on time with the European Union's "Markets in Financial Instruments Directive" ('MiFID II').

MiFID II, which comes into effect on January 3, 2018, demands that all financial services firms in Europe must keep records of all services, activities and transactions for at least five years.

Records include all electronic and instant messaging communications, telephone conversations and text messages related to or intended to conclude in a transaction, even if one does not occur.

"VoxSmart is the only global mobile compliance solution that can capture, record, store and analyse both voice and third party instant message applications such as WhatsApp and WeChat," said Oliver Blower (read more...)