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	Record number of environmental defenders murdered by Global Witness, agencies   A record number of activists working to protect the environment and land rights were murdered last year, according to a report by a campaign group.   227 people were killed in 2020, the highest number recorded for a second consecutive year, the report from Global Witness said.   Almost a third of the murders were reportedly linked to resource exploitation - logging, mining, large-scale agribusiness, hydroelectric dams and other infrastructure.   The report called the victims "environmental defenders" killed for protecting natural resources that need to be preserved, including forests, water supplies and oceans.   “On average, our data shows that four defenders have been killed every week since the signing of the Paris climate agreement [in 2016],” the report says. “As the climate crisis deepens, forest fires rampage across swathes of the planet, drought destroys farmland, and floods leave thousands dead, the situation for frontline communities and defenders of the Earth is getting worse.”   It said this "shocking figure" was likely to be an underestimate, because of growing restrictions on journalists and other civic freedoms.   Logging was the industry linked to the most murders with 23 cases - with attacks in Brazil, Nicaragua, Peru and the Philippines.   Indigenous peoples, most often on the frontline of climate change, accounted for a further one third of cases. Colombia had the highest recorded attacks, with 65 people killed last year.   A senior campaigner for Global Witness, Chris Madden, called on governments to "get serious about protecting defenders." He said companies must start "putting people and planet before profit' or he warned that "both climate breakdown and the killings" would continue.   "This dataset is another stark reminder that fighting the climate crisis carries an unbearably heavy burden for some, who risk their lives to save the forests, rivers and biospheres that are essential to counteract unsustainable global warming. This must stop'.   The organization called on governments to formally recognize the human right to a safe, healthy and sustainable environment, and ensure commitments made at November's UN climate change conference, COP26, integrate human rights protections.   Those murdered included South African Fikile Ntshangase, 65, who was involved in a legal dispute over the extension of an opencast mine operated by Tendele Coal near Somkhele in KwaZulu-Natal province. She was shot dead in her own living room.   Her daughter, Malungelo Xhakaza, 31, said her "mother's struggle lives on." She said, "To this day no arrests have been made in the investigation into my mother's murder. There has been no accountability. It seems to me that someone wants this mine expansion and the extraction to go ahead, no matter the cost."   Petmin Limited, which owns the Somkhele mine through its subsidiary Tendele Coal Mining, told Global Witness that it "acknowledges community tensions may have been a factor in Fikile's death." The company said it "strongly condemns any form of violence or intimidation" and has offered full co-operation with the police.   The killings also included Oscar Eyraud Adams, who was murdered in Mexico in September 2020. He was working to help the indigenous Kumiai community in Baja California have better access to water.   Global Witness said activists still under threat included communities in Guapinol in Honduras, where dozens of people have been protesting against an iron oxide mining concession that was granted by the central government in a protected area. Campaigners believe the Guapinol river, a vital water source, is threatened. The organisation says "many community members remain incarcerated."   http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/environmental-activists/last-line-defence/ http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/environmental-activists/ http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/environmental-activists/numbers-lethal-attacks-against-defenders-2012/ http://www.globalwitness.org/en/blog/planet-v-profit-stories-climate-crisis/ http://www.globalwitness.org/en/blog/ Visit the related web page
	Facebook is putting profit before public good, says whistleblower by Washington Post, InfluenceMap, agencies   Oct. 2021   Facebook is putting profit before public good, says whistleblower. (AP, agencies)   A data scientist who worked with Facebook has accused the social media company of choosing profit over reducing the platform's potential to spread misinformation and foster radicalisation.   In an interview with the U.S. TV program 60 Minutes, Frances Haugen revealed herself as the person who anonymously filed complaints with US law enforcement officials, alleging the company's own research showed how it magnified hate and misinformation.   Ms Haugen, who worked at Google and Pinterest before joining Facebook in 2019, said she had asked to work in an area of the company that fought misinformation because she had lost a friend to online conspiracy theories.   "Facebook, over and over again, has shown it chooses profit over safety," she said.   Ms Haugen, who will testify before US Congress this week, said she hoped her activism would make the government more strictly regulate Facebook's activities.   She said Facebook prematurely turned off safeguards designed to thwart misinformation and rabble rousing after Joe Biden defeated Donald Trump in last year's US presidential election, alleging the company's decision contributed to the deadly January 6 invasion of the US Capitol.   After the election, the company dissolved a unit on civic integrity where she had been working, which Ms Haugen said was the moment she realised "I don't trust that they're willing to actually invest what needs to be invested to keep Facebook from being dangerous".   Ms Haugen said a 2018 change to Facebook's content flow favoured hateful content. She said despite the enmity that the new algorithms were feeding, Facebook found they helped keep people coming back — a pattern that helped the social media giant sell more of the digital ads that generate most of its advertising.   Facebook's annual revenue has more than doubled from $US56 billion ($77 billion) in 2018 to a projected $US119 billion this year, based on the estimates of analysts surveyed by financial data company FactSet.   The 60 Minutes interview intensifies the spotlight already glaring on Facebook as politicians and regulators around the world scrutinise the social networking's immense power to shape opinions and its polarising effects on society.   The backlash has been intensifying since mid-September, when The Wall Street Journal published an exposé based on leaks from Ms Haugen that revealed Facebook's internal research.   It concluded the social network's attention-seeking algorithms had helped foster political dissent and contributed to mental health and emotional problems among teenagers, especially girls. The revelations prompted an indefinite delay in the rollout of a children's version of Instagram, developed by Facebook.   Ms Haugen has filed at least eight complaints with US securities regulators alleging Facebook has violated the law by withholding information about the risks posed by its social network, according to 60 Minutes.   "No-one at Facebook is malevolent," Ms Haugen said during the interview. "But the incentives are misaligned. "Facebook makes more money when you consume more content. People enjoy engaging with things that elicit an emotional reaction. And the more anger that they get exposed to, the more they interact and the more they consume." http://bit.ly/3mmNM4L   http://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2021/10/05/facebook-senate-hearing-frances-haugen/ http://www.vice.com/en/article/qj873p/facebook-whistleblower-says-company-chooses-profits-over-safety-all-the-time http://socialeurope.eu/facebook-files-and-eprivacy-lobbying-expose-the-power-of-big-tech http://time.com/6107835/sophie-zhang-facebook-testimony/ http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/23/facebook-whistleblower-january-6-capitol-attack http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2022/jan/19/facebook-india-impact-report-human-rights-concerns http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/digital-threats/ethiopia-hate-speech/ http://www.vice.com/en/article/88g4x3/trump-endorsing-qanon-candidates http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-features/facebook-papers-shocking-revelations-1247611/ http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/oct/07/facebooks-role-in-myanmar-and-ethiopia-under-new-scrutiny http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/09/global-facebook-giving-powerful-users-free-rein-to-harass-others-make-false-claims-and-incite-violence/   Aug. 2021   Climate Change and Digital Advertising: The Oil and Gas industry's Digital Advertising Strategy. (InfluenceMap)   "Despite Facebook's public support for climate action, it continues to allow its platform to be used to spread fossil fuel propaganda.   Not only is Facebook inadequately enforcing its existing advertising policies, it's clear that these policies are not keeping pace with the critical need for urgent climate action. If Facebook is serious about its climate commitments, it needs to rethink whether it's willing to keep taking the money of fossil fuel companies". Bill Weihl, ClimateVoice Founder & former Director of Sustainability at Facebook   "Based on a robust scientific methodology, this study shows how fossil fuel interests manipulate individuals using sophisticated social media strategies. Their ads play on existing community values to build support for the continuation of a carbon intensive economy, contradicting the supposed commitment of these firms to address the climate crisis. Climate advocates need to understand and work to counter these campaigns. InfluenceMap has provided a vital window into the propaganda efforts of fossil fuel interests". Dr. Robert Brulle, Professor of Environment, Brown University   Evidence shows that in the past, major oil and gas companies have both directly and indirectly denied or cast significant doubt on the science of climate change.   The purpose of denying climate change has been to prevent the implementation of regulation that would limit or mitigate climate change as such regulation would have reduced the demand for fossil fuels, including oil and gas.   With increasing scrutiny from investors, regulators and the public, however, outright denial has increasingly become an unviable tactic for these major companies. In its place, oil and gas companies have developed an increasingly nuanced and subtle set of messaging techniques, often utilizing elements of the science on climate change in misleading ways.   Many of these messages are used on Facebook and social media platforms, a new frontier and tool for influencing the debate around climate. With a wealth of information on its 2.85 billion monthly active users, Facebook presents advertisers with unparalleled opportunities to promote their message in a highly targeted and effective manner.   New research from InfluenceMap reveals the latest iteration of the oil and gas industry’s playbook on climate change. The research shows the oil and gas industry is now using social media as a key avenue for advertising, posting thousands of social issue, election, and political ads every year which are designed to prolong the use of oil and gas in the energy mix.   This research found 25,147 ads from just 25 oil and gas sector organizations on Facebook’s US platforms in 2020, which have been seen over 431 million times. This indicates the industry is now using social media to directly reach a vast audience and influence public opinions on climate change and the energy mix. These ads had a spend of $9,597,376.   The ads promoted either the climate-friendliness of the industry, including voluntary targets, investments into renewables, and promoting fossil gas as green, or promoted an ongoing role for oil and gas in the energy mix.   Crucially, many of these ads either contained misleading content or present information that was misaligned from the science of climate change according to both the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s and the International Energy Agency’s reports on reaching net zero by 2050.   Despite its own commitment to mitigate climate change, Facebook continues to receive millions of dollars from the oil and gas industry every year to post ads.   For the 25,147 social issue, election and political ads covered in this research, Facebook received $9,597,376. While continuing to accept this money, the research also found Facebook has not been consistently applying its own advertising policies regarding climate change ads.   As such, the real revenue Facebook receives from the oil and gas sector is likely to be significantly higher when accounting for the entire industry and the true number of climate change ads posted. http://bit.ly/3yHnGyu   * Global Witness: The climate divide: How Facebook's algorithm amplifies climate disinformation: http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/digital-threats/climate-divide-how-facebooks-algorithm-amplifies-climate-disinformation/   Twitter continues to fall short on protecting women online. (Amnesty International)   Twitter is still not doing enough to protect women users from online violence and abuse, new analysis from Amnesty International found.   The Twitter Scorecard grades the social media company’s record on implementing a series of recommendations to tackle abuse against women.   Despite some welcome progress stemming from recommendations put forth in Amnesty’s 2020 Scorecard, Twitter needs to do much more to address the online abuse of women and/or marginalized groups.   The company has fully implemented just one of the ten recommendations in the report, with limited progress in improving transparency around the content moderation process and appeals process.   “Despite our repeated calls to improve their platform, Twitter is still falling short on its promises to protect users at heightened risk of online abuse,” said Michael Kleinman, Director of Technology and Human Rights at Amnesty International USA.   “For a company whose mission is to ‘give everyone the power to create and share ideas instantly without barriers,’ it’s become abundantly clear that women and/or marginalized groups disproportionately face threats to their online safety.”   A survey commissioned by Amnesty International also shows that women who are more active on the platform were more likely to report experiencing online abuse, compared to those less active – 40 per cent of women who use the platform more than once a day report experiencing abuse, compared to thirteen per cent who use the platform less than once a week.   Amnesty International also asked women who chose not to report abuse why they did not do so. Notably,100 per cent of the women who use the platform numerous times a week and who didn’t report abuse responded that it was “not worth the effort”.   Though Twitter has made some progress, it is far from enough. They have increased the amount of information available through their Help Center and Transparency Reports, while also launching new public awareness campaigns, expanding the scope of their hateful conduct policy, and improving their reporting mechanisms and privacy and security features. Though these are important steps, the problem remains.   In response to this report, Twitter shared with Amnesty International: “We’re committed to experimenting in public with product solutions that help address the fundamental problems our users are facing, and empowering them with controls to set their own experience. While many of these changes are not directly captured in your report scorecard, we believe these improvements will ultimately enable our most vulnerable communities to better engage in free expression without fear, a goal we share with Amnesty.”   Yet Twitter must do more in order for women and non-binary persons – as well as all users, in all languages – to be able to use the platform without fear of abuse. As a company, Twitter has a corporate responsibility and moral obligation to take concrete steps to avoid causing or contributing to human rights abuses, including by providing effective remedy for any actual impact it has inflicted on its users.   “We have seem time and time again that Twitter has continuously failed to provide effective remedies for the real harm and impact its platform has caused women and/or marginalized groups,” added Michael Kleinman, Director of Technology and Human Rights at Amnesty International USA.   “As our world has become increasingly dependent on digital spaces during the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s critical that Twitter meet this moment with demonstrated commitment to improving the online experiences of all users, regardless of their identity.”   http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2021/12/global-twitter-continues-to-fall-short-on-protecting-women-online-new-report/ http://www.amnesty.org/en/search/twitter/   * Human rights defenders around the world who seek to address sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) have long used video as an effective tool to empower survivors. For 30 years, WITNESS has worked side-by-side with survivors of sexual and gender-based violence, activists in transnational movements, partnered groups and allies to produce video that advocate for the rights of survivors and also tell their stories:   http://blog.witness.org/2022/03/supporting-survivors-of-sgbv-documenting-evidence/   * A series of links to further rights concerns raised in the digital realm:   http://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/04/european-union-digital-services-act-agreement-a-watershed-moment-for-internet-regulation/ http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/DigitalAge/Pages/SeminarArtificialIntelligence.aspx http://undocs.org/A/HRC/47/24/Add.2 http://undocs.org/A/HRC/47/25 http://www.ohchr.org/en/issues/digitalage/pages/digitalageindex.aspx http://international-review.icrc.org/articles/ai-humanitarian-action-human-rights-ethics-913 http://carrcenter.hks.harvard.edu/technology-human-rights http://www.schwarzmancentre.ox.ac.uk/ethicsinai http://carnegieendowment.org/specialprojects/digitaldemocracynetwork http://digitalfreedomfund.org/ http://rm.coe.int/unboxing-artificial-intelligence-10-steps-to-protect-human-rights-reco/1680946e64 http://www.business-humanrights.org/en/big-issues/technology-human-rights/artificial-intelligence-ai/ http://bit.ly/2Sllcpk http://bit.ly/2SZrHyx   http://www.rightscon.org/ http://www.rightscon.org/past-events/online-2020/ http://www.accessnow.org/the-toronto-declaration-protecting-the-rights-to-equality-and-non-discrimination-in-machine-learning-systems/ http://www.accessnow.org/tag/artificial-intelligence/ http://www.accessnow.org/content-type/press-releases/ http://www.globalwitness.org/en/campaigns/digital-threats/ http://blog.witness.org/2021/09/eyes-on-internet-shutdowns/ http://blog.witness.org/2021/01/truth-lies-accountability-2021/ http://minorityrights.org/publications/minority-and-indigenous-trends-2020/ http://www.openglobalrights.org/digital-welfare-state-and-what-it-means-for-human-rights/ http://chrgj.org/focus-areas/technology/ http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-59441379   http://algorithmwatch.org/en/instagram-research-shut-down-by-facebook/ http://algorithmwatch.org/en/robo-debt-france/ http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/jun/11/robodebt-court-approves-18bn-settlement-for-victims-of-governments-shameful-failure http://www.amnesty.org/en/topic/technology-and-human-rights/ http://5rightsfoundation.com/newsroom/ http://www.newsguardtech.com/reports/ http://www.dw.com/en/rohingya-refugees-file-lawsuit-against-facebook-over-genocide/a-60038553 http://www.dw.com/en/rohingya-vs-facebook-what-are-the-chances-of-success/a-60079433   http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/humanrights/2020/07/16/beginning-of-artificial-intelligence-end-of-human-rights/ http://www.opendemocracy.net/en/digitaliberties/ http://www.article19.org/resources/international-santa-clara-principles-and-the-push-for-transparency/ http://santaclaraprinciples.org/ http://lab.witness.org/ http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/nov/30/more-than-a-third-of-worlds-population-has-never-used-the-internet-says-un http://socialeurope.eu/the-metaverse-is-a-labour-issue http://mediawell.ssrc.org/ http://www.stopkillerrobots.org/ Visit the related web page
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