News of the Cyber World

[kyonides]

Elon Musk reveals US intel agencies had 'full access'
to private Twitter DMs, discloses new encryption feature

...the United States, along with foreign government agencies, was granted "full access" to direct messages of private citizens on Twitter prior to his takeover.

Musk made the bombshell allegation in the Carlson sit-down, the first part of which aired Monday on "Tucker Carlson Tonight." In a rare and unfiltered discussion, the Tesla and SpaceX CEO spoke candidly about his concerns about artificial intelligence (AI), his Twitter acquisition and his future plans for the social media platform that he bought last fall.
...
"The degree to which government agencies effectively had full access to everything that was going on on Twitter blew my mind," Musk told Carlson. "I was not aware of that."

"Would that include people’s DMs?" the Fox News host asked Musk.

"Yes," Musk replied. "Because the DM's aren't encrypted."

Musk said he is moving to create a feature that would give users the option to encrypt direct messages with the hopes of limiting government interference. Musk said he hopes to unveil the new addition later this month.

If the encryption option is selected, "no one at Twitter can see what you're talking about," he explained.

"You could put a gun to my head and I couldn't tell you," he told Carlson. "That's how it should be."
...
The new encryption feature for direct messages would effectively give "the finger" to U.S. intelligence agencies and their counterparts abroad who've long relied on the platform to gather intel, Carlson told viewers. Musk said he has already received "indirect complaints" from various agencies about the crackdown, quipping that while they're displeased with the move.
...
"If I got something that was unconstitutional from the U.S. government, my reply would be to send them a copy of the First Amendment and just say, 'What part of this are we getting wrong?’"

Encrypted Message Platforms Threaten to
Pull Services From UK Over Online Safety Bill

Seven of the world’s leading messaging apps have written a scathing open letter to the UK government over its proposed Online Safety Bill.

Bosses from firms including Signal and WhatsApp say the bill would lead to the mass surveillance of personal communications in what would become the “British internet.”

Urging ministers to “urgently rethink” the legislation, they said it “poses an unprecedented threat to the privacy, safety and security of every UK citizen and the people with whom they communicate around the world.”

If given the go-ahead in its current form, tech bosses said they would have no choice but to withdraw services from the UK in what experts said would set a “concerning global precedent” on encryption.

The Home Office has defended the plans, arguing that tech firms had a “moral duty” to ensure law enforcement agencies were not kept in the dark about “unprecedented levels of child sexual abuse on their platforms.”

The House of Lords will begin line-by-line scrutiny of the legislation in its committee stage on Wednesday.

The firms warned the legislation would give regulator Ofcom the power to try to force the release of private messages on end-to-end encrypted communication services.

 Could it be because that is an integral part of their evil plans? Governments love to spy  on people. I know it, you know it as well. So stop pretending they are good and holy as if they could never do anything against you ever.

Maryland Schools Latest to Join Lawsuit
Against Social Media Giants for Mental Health Harm

Several Maryland school districts, including Cecil, Carroll, and Montgomery County Public Schools, recently joined the growing number of U.S. school districts taking social media companies like TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat, to court, alleging the companies are designed to encourage youth addiction and are fueling a mental health crisis among young people.

“What we’ve seen recently—the game changer—is the actual mental health impact social media is having on students during the school day when they are supposed to be learning,” Cecil County superintendent Dr. Jeffrey Lawson told local CBS station WJZ-TV.

Lawson said students use social media at school when they should be focused on their school work.

“At the moment, when the student is interacting on social media, it’s not an easy thing for a parent to be aware of,” Lawson said. “What we’re looking for is some sort of the fundamental change in the way children are able to access social media in such an addictive way.”

These schools are trying to combat social media’s adverse and often deadly effects. According to Mr. William Shinoff, the lead attorney for the lawsuit, the increased use of social media has led to the schools seeing increased mental health problems.
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“We’ve seen an increase in depression, anxiety, eating disorders, and even unfortunately, suicide rates have gone up,” he added.
...
Dr. Jean Twenge, an American psychologist who researches and writes about social media’s effect on youth, told San Diego State University in a 2022 interview that “heavy users of social media (five-plus hours a day) are twice as likely to be depressed as non-users. Facebook’s research found that using Instagram led to body image issues for many teen girls.”

Florida, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, California, and Washington are some other states whose schools have filed similar lawsuits.

Conglomerate Starboard Buys Parler,
to Shut Down Social Media App Temporarily

Digital media conglomerate Starboard said on Friday it has bought Parler for an undisclosed sum and will temporarily shut down the social media app popular with conservatives to give itself time to roll out a revamped version of the platform.

The move comes months after the collapse of a deal that would have seen American rapper Kanye West, who now goes by Ye, buy the platform’s parent company Parlement Technologies.

Starboard, formerly Olympic Media, founded in 2018 houses conservative-leaning platforms American Wire and BizPac Review. It plans to service “unsupported online communities” and build a home for them “away from the ad-hoc regulatory hand of platforms that hate them.”

The Arlington, Virginia-based conglomerate did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for details on terms of the deal. However, it said the acquisition will be accretive by the end of second quarter 2023.

In September, Parler announced that it has restructured into Parlement Technologies Inc. and bought Irvine, California-based private cloud services company Dynascale Inc..

Parler, which was founded five years ago, was reinstated on Google and Apple Inc.’s app stores after being removed following the U.S. Capitol breach in January 2021.