Facebook scraps 'Trending' section that ignited fracas over anti-conservative bias

Facebook announced Friday will remove its “Trending” topics section, the snafu-plagued module behind the 2016 uproar over the suppression of conservative news.

The feature, introduced in 2014, will be pulled next week and replaced with other venues for news access, with an emphasis on mobile access and video, Alex Hardiman, head of Facebook news products, said in a post.

“From research we found that over time people found the product to be less and less useful,” he said. “We will remove Trending from Facebook next week and we will also remove products and third-party partner integrations that rely on the Trends API.”

The soon-to-debut features include a news video section on Facebook Watch “where people can view live coverage, daily news briefings and weekly deep dives that are exclusive to watch.”

Facebook is also testing a feature that “lets publishers put a ‘breaking news’ indicator on their posts in News Feed,” and a dedicated section called “Today In” that links to local publishers, officials and organizations.

The “Trending” section, located in the top right corner of the page, currently provides links to stories on third-party news outlets, primarily newspapers, wire services, magazines and television websites.

One problem is that the feature wasn’t driving much traffic, only accounting for about 1.5 percent of clicks to publishers on average, Mr. Hardiman said.

The section landed in the middle of a brouhaha over bias when Gizmodo reported in May 2016 that Facebook workers were squelching popular reports about conservatives and injecting other stories that wouldn’t qualify for inclusion on their own.

The anti-conservative slant also resulted in fewer links to right-of-center news outlets.

“Stories covered by conservative outlets (like Breitbart, Washington Examiner, and Newsmax) that were trending enough to be picked up by Facebook’s algorithm were excluded unless mainstream sites like the New York Times, the BBC, and CNN covered the same stories,” said Gizmodo in the report.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg denied the allegations but met a week later with a dozen leading conservatives “to talk about how we can make sure Facebook continues to be a platform for all ideas across the political spectrum.”

A few months later, Facebook also fired its trending team in order to rely instead primarily on a computer algorithm, which resulted in its own set of problems, including the posting of a fake story about then-Fox News host Megyn Kelly being fired for supporting Hillary Clinton.

https:// www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/jun/1/facebook-scraps-trending-section-ignited-fracas-ov/

Russian lawmakers request testimony from Facebook's Zuckerberg after interviews in U.S., EU

Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg faced calls Wednesday to testify in front of Russian lawmakers following his recent appearances before panels in the U.S. and Europe.

The Federation Council, the upper house of Russia’s parliament, will invite Mr. Zuckerberg to speak at one of its upcoming meetings, Speaker Valentina Matviyenko said Wednesday, Russian media reported.

“Whether he will be able to come or not is a secondary issue, but I would support a proposal to invite him to one of our sessions,” said Ms. Matviyenko, the state-owned TASS news agency reported. “I issued an order, we sent an invitation and will try to organize his arrival.”

Senator Anton Belyakov has invited Mr. Zuckerberg to deliver a speech at an “Expert Hour” session held by lawmakers, according to TASS.

“I am absolutely confident that this is a person who has ideas to share and who is looking to the future,” said Mr. Belyakov, a member of the small A Just Russia party, TASS reported.

The Federal Council’s efforts to secure Mr. Zuckerberg’s appearance emerged on the heels of his appearance last week before the European Parliament in Brussels, where the Facebook founder faced scrutiny from politicians and lawmakers over the social network’s policies for protecting user data and preventing the spread of fake news, among other matters.

Weeks earlier, Mr. Zuckerberg publicly testified before committees in both the U.S. House and Senate as Facebook came under fire over its ties to Cambridge Analytica, a British-based company that collected the personal information of 87 million Facebook users without their permission.

Representatives for Facebook did not immediately return an email seeking comment Wednesday on the Russian lawmakers’ request.

Earlier this month, meanwhile, a member of the U.K. Parliament threatened to issue a summons ordering Mr. Zuckerberg to appear before lawmakers in London after he refused previous requests.

https:// www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/may/30/russian-lawmakers-request-testimony-facebooks-zuck/

Stingray devices used to spy on cellphone activity discovered around D.C., near White House: DHS

Devices known as “Stingrays” capable of intercepting cellphone calls and text messages were found operating near the White House and other sensitive places around D.C., a top Department of Homeland Security official wrote in a letter released Friday.

Federal officials made the discovery while conducting a pilot project last year meant to identify and investigate activity around the nation’s capital involving the surveillance tools, also known as International Mobile Subscriber Identity (IMSI) catchers, Christopher Krebs, the acting head of the DHS National Protection and Programs Directorate, wrote Sen. Ron Wyden, Oregon Democrat.

The pilot project uncovered “anomalous activity that appeared consistent with IMSI catcher technology” within the D.C. region, Mr. Krebs wrote, “including locations in proximity to potentially sensitive facilities like the White House.”

DHS was unable to detect who was operating the devices or their purposes, and investigations were subsequently launched by law enforcement and counterintelligence agencies, he wrote in response to an inquiry from Mr. Wyden.

“The news of a possible foreign stingray near the White House is of particular concern giving reports that the president isn’t even using a secure phone to protect his calls,” Mr. Wyden said in a statement. “The cavalier attitude toward our national security appears to be coming from the top down.”

Designed to mimic legitimate cellular towers, rudimentary Stingrays work by forcing a connection with phones within range, in turn collecting information about nearby devices including their geographic locations and metadata about the calls they’ve made. Advanced IMSI catchers have greater capabilities, however, including the ability to alter communications and intercept the contents of unencrypted phone calls and text messages, according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights group that has lobbied against their use by law enforcement.

Mr. Trump has used cellphone that lack security features meant to shield his communications from eavesdroppers, according to recent news reports, spurring Sen. Tom Carper, Delaware Democrat, to press the Pentagon last week for information about the measure in place to protect the president’s device.

“The White House is confident in the security protocols in place for the president’s use of communications devices,” a senior White House official told ABC News last month.

https:// www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/jun/1/stingray-devices-used-spy-cellphone-activity-disco/

Army releases footage of 'third arm' prototype resembling 'Aliens'-like tech

The U.S. Army Research Laboratory has released footage of a new “third arm” prototype for troops that shows the usefulness of exoskeletons on the battlefield.

Infantrymen have been required to “shoot, move and communicate” while carrying heavy weapons throughout history, but future conflicts are primed to lessen the load with exoskeletons. A glimpse into the future was provided this week with a video uploaded to ARL’s YouTube channel.

“It’s really falling into line with some of the new priorities that are coming from higher up in the Army now with the modernization effort,” ARL engineer Dan Baechle said Tuesday. “I think exoskeletons are explicitly mentioned in some of the priority documents from the Army. In the future, I hope that third arm, or what we learn from third arm, will lead to a fielded device that improves outcomes from the dismounted soldier. It improves lethality, it improves survivability.”

ARL’s video includes footage of testing from Aberdeen Proving Ground, Maryland. Troops trained with 22-pound M249 and 25-pound M240B machine guns attached to the device.

The military website Task and Purpose aptly noted that third arm is well on its way to turning science fiction into reality.

“We’ve been obsessively tracking the Army’s work on the ‘third arm’ exoskeleton due to its delightful resemblance to the mechanical harness for the M56A2 Smart Gun from Aliens, and lo, our patience has paid off,” the website reported Friday. “Apparently, the third arm is getting enough attention from senior DoD officials that it may head downrange sooner than expected.”

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/jun/1/army-releases-footage-of-third-arm-prototype-resem/

Nathan Larson, congressional hopeful, admits to being a pedophile: Report

Nathan Larson, a candidate running for Congress in the November midterm elections, wrote about raping children on websites he created for pedophiles, HuffPost reported Thursday.

An accountant and convicted felon, Mr. Larson is running as an independent candidate seeking the U.S. House seat currently held by incumbent Rep. Barbara Comstock, Virginia Republican.

Mr. Larson, 37, admitted in an interview that he ran now-defunct websites that hosted forums geared towards pedophiles, suiped.org and incelocalypse.today, HuffPost reported.

On those sites and others, Mr. Larson penned numerous posts endorsing child rape and other forms of sexual abuse, the report said.

“A lot of people are tired of political correctness and being constrained by it,” Mr. Larson said when questioned about the posts. “People prefer when there’s an outsider who doesn’t have anything to lose and is willing to say what’s on a lot of people’s minds.”

According to HuffPo, Mr. Larson admitted being a pedophile after reporters asked him if he engages in the act or merely writes about it.

“It’s a mix of both. When people go over the top there’s a grain of truth to what they say,” he said.

The term “pedophile” is “vague” and “just a label,” he told HuffPost, adding that it’s “normal” for men to be attracted to underage women.

Both suiped.org and incelocalypse.today were taken offline earlier this week after the company hosting both domains was contacted by Babe.com, a website that first linked Mr. Larson to the posts, and HuffPost contacted the congressional hopeful after learning that his campaign website shared an internet protocol (IP) address with the sites.

“I just want to bang my daughter,” Mr. Larson wrote in a 2017 post he admitted penning on Suiped.org. “Don’t forget: feminism is the problem, and rape is the solution,” he wrote on another site, HuffPost reported.

Mr. Larson was convicted in 2009 for ‘threatening the president of United States,’ according to court documents, and he subsequently severed 16 months in federal prison.

Virginia previously barred convicted felons from seeking office and voting, but the state’s former governor, Terry McAuliffe, restored those rights in 2016.

https:// www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/jun/1/nathan-larson-congressional-hopeful-revealed-opera/