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Russia tells Google to stop spreading threats against Russians on YouTube

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  • Russia demands YouTube to stop spreading threats to Russians.
  • Facebook, Instagram blocked in Russia; Google under pressure.
  • Russia says it has the tools to develop its own social media.

Russia on Friday demanded that Alphabet Inc’s (GOOGL.O) Google stop spreading what it called threats against Russian citizens on its YouTube video-sharing platform, a move that could presage an outright block of the service on Russian territory.

The regulator, Roskomnadzor, said adverts on the platform were calling for the communications systems of Russia and Belarus’ railway networks to be suspended and that their dissemination was evidence of the U.S. company’s anti-Russian position. It did not say which accounts were publishing the adverts.

“The actions of YouTube’s administration are of a terrorist nature and threaten the life and health of Russian citizens,” the regulator said.

“Roskomnadzor categorically opposes such advertising campaigns and demands that Google stop broadcasting anti-Russia videos as soon as possible.”

Google removed an advertisement that was flagged by the Russian government, according to a source familiar with the matter who declined to describe it.

The dispute was the latest in a series between Moscow and foreign tech firms over Ukraine.

YouTube, which has blocked Russian state-funded media globally, is under heavy pressure from Russia’s communications regulator and politicians.

Outraged that Meta Platforms (FB.O) was allowing social media users in Ukraine to post messages such as “Death to the Russian invaders”, Moscow blocked Instagram this week, having already stopped access to Facebook because of what it said were restrictions by the platform on Russian media.

Russian news media including RIA and Sputnik quoted an unnamed source as saying YouTube could be blocked next week or as early as Friday.

Domestic alternatives

Former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Friday wrote a fierce criticism of foreign social media firms, mentioning by name both Meta and YouTube, but he hinted that the door leading to their possible return to the Russian market would be left ajar.

“The ‘guardians’ of free speech have in all seriousness allowed users of their social media to wish death upon the Russian military,” Medvedev, who served as president from 2008 to 2012 and is now deputy secretary of Russia’s Security Council, wrote on the messaging app Telegram.

Medvedev said Russia has the necessary tools and experience to develop its own social media, saying the “one-way game” of Western firms controlling information flows could not continue.

“In order to return, they will have to prove their independence and good attitude to Russia and its citizens,” he wrote. “However, it is not a fact that they will be able to dip their toes in the same water twice.”

VKontakte, Russia’s answer to Facebook, has been breaking records for activity on its platform since Russia sent troops into Ukraine on Feb. 24.

The site attracted 300,000 new users in the two weeks after Russia began what it calls a “special operation” to demilitarise and “de-Nazify” its neighbour.

On the day Instagram was blocked in Russia, VKontakte said its daily domestic audience grew by 8.7% to more than 50 million people, a new record.

Anton Gorelkin, a member of Russia’s State Duma Committee on information and communications, pointed Russians to services that would help them move videos from YouTube to the domestic equivalent, RuTube.

“It’s not that I’m calling for everyone to immediately leave YouTube,” he said on his Telegram channel. “But, probably, in light of recent events, it is worth following the principle of not keeping all your eggs in one basket.”

He said earlier this week that YouTube may face the same fate as Instagram if it continues “to act as a weapon in the information war”.

Russian tech entrepreneurs said this week they would launch picture-sharing application Rossgram on the domestic market to help fill the void left by Instagram. read more

In November, Gazprom Media launched Yappy as a domestic rival to video-sharing platform TikTok.

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TikTok offers a special in-app experience to commemorate the release of Jimin’s second solo album, MUSE, by BTS.

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Calibre fans everywhere get the chance to interact with only-available content, take part in challenges, and get temporary rewards by visiting the #Jimin_Who hub. To find a time-limited, exclusive profile frame, search for relevant terms like “Jimin” and “BTS.” You’ll be provided with difficulties. Moreover, the hub offers high-calibre content produced by Jimin, such as his solo and collaborative works, Fan Spotlight, which highlights exceptional ARMY members and their works, and an immersive event honouring Jimin’s second album, MUSE.

TikTok is committed to enabling fans and artists to interact and create, as this programme demonstrates. The TikTok community worldwide is expected to find resonance in this experience, as BTS is one of the most popular accounts and #kpop is one of the fastest-growing genres on the platform, producing 59.8 million posts and 602 billion video views.

BTS (@bts_official_bighit) broke numerous records throughout their more than ten-year tenure, becoming the fourth-largest artist account on TikTok and cementing their status as pop icons of the twenty-first century.

The group’s hashtags, #bts and #bts_official_bighit, are part of 94.1 million creator videos and 33.4 million videos, respectively, and have over 65.5 million followers and 1.4 billion likes. Because of his solo work, Jimin has become an international phenomenon, inspiring millions of creator videos and views.

In over 22.9 million creator videos, hashtags pertaining to #jimin have appeared. The group’s TikTok dance video, which was viewed over 36.2 million times and received over 8.6 million likes, was inspired by Jimin’s #1 song, “Like Crazy,” which he released last year after his debut solo album FACE. The song inspired over 300,000 creator videos. The MUSE pre-release single “Smeraldo Garden Marching Band (feat. Loco)” has received 2.5 million likes and 11 million views on Jimin’s recent exclusive behind-the-scenes video.

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63,000 Instagram accounts are deleted by Meta

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The “Yahoo boys,” a group of Nigerian internet scammers, are well-known for their elaborate schemes, which include posing as needy individuals or promising phenomenal returns on investments from prominent Nigerian figures.

63,000 Instagram profiles, according to a statement by Meta, which also mentioned that 7,200 Facebook pages, groups, and accounts that offered advice on con artistry had been deleted.

The organisation also eliminated a smaller, more tightly-knit network of about 2,500 computers that belonged to a collective of about 20 people.

The prospect of compromising photos—fake or real—being released is used in sexual extortion, or “sextortion,” to coerce victims into paying to halt the abuse.

Meta notified the scammers’ attempts to the U.S. National Centre for Missing and Exploited Children, as most of the scammers’ attempts were unsuccessful and largely targeted adults, but there were also attempts made against kids.

The disruption of these networks was not new, according to Meta officials, who also disclosed the current operation in an effort to “raise awareness.”

Governments, particularly lawmakers in the US, where Meta is headquartered, have increased pressure on the social media behemoth to address allegations that its executives have disregarded data indicating that its services are harmful to children. As a result, the company has been under defensive fire in recent years.

One American senator charged Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Meta, and other prominent figures in the social media space earlier this year, saying they had “blood on their hands” for not doing enough to shield young people from the growing risks of sexual predatory content on their platforms.

Additionally, in an effort to raise awareness of these risks, the U.S. Surgeon General has advocated for social media apps to have a warning label attached.

A part of the national penal code that dealt with fraud ineffectively gave rise to the term “419 scams” for Nigerian con artists.

Online frauds have increased in number, with individuals responsible operating from wealthy neighbourhoods, college dorms, or impoverished suburban areas while the nation of more than 200 million people experiences increasing economic woes.

A few users, according to Meta, were giving advice on how to pull off scams.

It stated, “Among their attempts were links to photo collections that they could use to create fictitious accounts, as well as offers to sell scripts and instructions to deceive people with.”

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Google abandons its plans to do rid of cookies in Chrome

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The significant change in course comes as a result of worries expressed by advertisers, who provide the majority of the company’s revenue, that their capacity to gather data for customised advertisements will be restricted due to the removal of cookies from the most widely used browser in the world, leaving them reliant on Google’s user databases.

Due to worries that Google’s proposal would stifle competition in the digital advertising market, the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority has also carefully examined the proposal.

“Rather than discontinuing third-party cookies, we would launch a fresh experience in Chrome that empowers individuals to make a knowledgeable decision that is applicable to all of their online browsing, and they could modify that decision whenever they choose,” stated Anthony Chavez, vice president of the Privacy Sandbox project, which is supported by Google, in a blog post.

A major objective of the Privacy Sandbox project, which was started in 2019 by Alphabet (GOOGL.O), opens new tab unit, is to phase out third-party cookies while simultaneously improving online privacy and boosting digital enterprises.

Though they can potentially be used for unauthorised monitoring, cookies are information packets that websites and advertisers use to identify specific online users and follow their browsing patterns.

Within the European Union, publishers are required to obtain explicit agreement from users before storing cookies, as per the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Cookie deletion is another feature that most popular browsers offer.

While continuing to fund the Privacy Sandbox programme, Chavez stated that Google was collaborating on the new strategy with publishers, privacy organisations, and regulators like the UK’s Information Commissioner’s Office and CMA.

Many responded differently to the announcement.

Analyst Evelyn Mitchell-Wolf of eMarketer stated in a statement, “Advertising stakeholders won’t have to prepare to quit third-party cookies cold turkey.”

One example of how cookies can hurt consumers is when they display predatory advertisements that target specific demographics, according to Lena Cohen, a staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. According to Cohen, Google’s choice to keep accepting third-party cookies is a direct result of their advertising-driven business model, even though other major browsers have been banning them for years.

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