Social Media

Politico reports: Congress is moving forward on a must-pass defense policy bill without repealing a legal shield for social media companies, despite a last-minute veto threat from President Donald Trump. The final version of the National Defense Authorization Act that will soon be considered by the House and Senate won’t include Trump’s long-sought repeal of the legal immunity for online …

The Daily Beast reports: Jeb Bush sparked an uproar on social media late Saturday for calling out the Twitter feed known as Room Rater for supposedly being too “partisan” in its assessments of Zoom and Skype backgrounds during the coronavirus pandemic. His post was apparently in response to Room Rater giving a Republican strategist only a nine out of 10 …

From the right wing Daily Caller: An advocacy group is warning parents about Parler, a social media app that has been touted as a free-speech platform and alternative to Twitter. Parents Together Action warned parents about the surging popularity of the app in the wake of the presidential election and its “extremist user base and almost non-existent moderation of content” …

Politico reports: The presidential @POTUS Twitter handle will automatically transfer to President-elect Joe Biden the moment he’s sworn in at noon on Inauguration Day — whether or not President Donald Trump has conceded, the company confirmed to POLITICO on Friday. Same goes for @whitehouse, @VP, @FLOTUS, and a handful other official accounts associated with the presidency. “Twitter is actively preparing …

The Washington Post reports: State and federal investigators are preparing to bring antitrust charges against Facebook that will challenge the tech giant’s acquisition of two rivals, Instagram and WhatsApp, alleging that the deals helped create an anti-competitive social networking juggernaut that has left users with few quality alternatives. The charges form a critical part of what could be a wide-ranging …

Reuters reports: Facebook chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg told an all-staff meeting on Thursday that former Trump White House adviser Steve Bannon had not violated enough of the company’s policies to justify his suspension when he urged beheading two senior U.S. officials, according to a recording heard by Reuters. “We have specific rules around how many times you need to violate …

Variety reports: YouTube will not produce its annual YouTube Rewind celebratory recap video this year — with the video giant saying it doesn’t feel appropriate, given the chaos of 2020. YouTube announced the decision to scrap Rewind in a statement on Twitter. “Since 2010, we’ve ended the year with Rewind: a look back at the year’s most impactful creators, videos …

Deadline reports: With many conservatives and Donald Trump backers in a lather over heightened scrutiny of Facebook and Twitter posts during election season, social media startup Parler is emerging as a fast-growing alternative. The Henderson, NV-based company, founded in 2018 by computer programmers John Matze and Jared Thomson, says its membership swelled to about 8 million from 4.5 million in …

The Guardian reports: Thousands of Donald Trump supporters have unwittingly found themselves in a Facebook group called “Gay Communists for Socialism”, after being tricked by its creators into joining what they thought was a pro-Trump election group. On Thursday, a Facebook group called “Stop the Steal”, a reference to the president’s false claims that Joe Biden is “stealing” the US …

Bloomberg News reports: As U.S. president, Donald Trump receives special treatment from Twitter Inc. when he violates the company’s rules around offensive or misleading content. That exemption will end in January if he loses the presidency. The social network treats transgressions from world leaders differently than those from regular users, and often leaves up tweets that violate its content policies, …

Buzzfeed News reports: As votes are being tallied across the country to determine the next US president, internal Facebook data shows that the company has seen a significant increase in what it calls “violence and incitement trends.” In a post to a group on Facebook’s internal message board, one employee alerted their colleagues to a nearly 45% increase in the …

This is surely a doomed effort but nobody will be surprised if Twitter does ban Trump shortly after he leaves office. The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law and the watchdog group Common Cause issued a joint request Thursday for Twitter to temporarily suspend President Trump’s account over the spread of disinformation about the election. The groups sent a …

CNET reports: Facebook on Thursday shut down a massive group with more than 348,000 members that was spreading misinformation about voter fraud. The public group, called “STOP THE STEAL,” was pushing false claims that Democrats are trying to “steal” the US presidential election. “In line with the exceptional measures that we are taking during this period of heightened tension, we …

Axios reports: Twitter on Monday provided more details about its policies around tweets that declare election results, and named the seven outlets it will lean on to help it determine whether a race is officially called. Driving the news: The list includes ABC News, AP, CNN, CBS News, Decision Desk HQ, Fox News and NBC News — all outlets that …

The Verge reports: TikTok got another reprieve from the Trump administration’s attempted ban today, as a federal judge in Pennsylvania blocked the government from moving ahead with restrictions that would have effectively shut down the app next month. The judge granted a preliminary injunction against a series of bans by the US Commerce Department that were set to go into …

Reuters reports: Facebook Inc’s Instagram said today it was making changes to its image sharing platform for U.S. users to prevent the spread of misinformation around the Nov. 3 presidential election. For users in the United States, Instagram temporarily removed the “Recent” tab from hashtag pages starting Thursday, it said in a statement on Twitter. “We’re doing this to reduce …

NBC News reports: Twitter said Monday it would begin placing messages at the top of users’ feeds to pre-emptively debunk false information about voting by mail and election results, an escalation of the tech company’s battle against misinformation. Twitter is calling the messages a “pre-bunk,” something it says it has never done, because the debunking is not a reaction to …

The Washington Post reports: State and federal investigators are expected to file antitrust charges against Facebook as soon as November, according to four people familiar with the matter, embarking on a massive legal challenge against the tech giant and its perceived ironclad grip over social media. The timing reflects a frenzy of recent activity on the part of the Federal …

The Guardian reports: Donald Trump’s Twitter account was hacked last week, after a Dutch researcher correctly guessed the president’s password: “maga2020!”, Dutch media reported. Victor Gevers, a security expert, had access to Trump’s direct messages, could post tweets in his name and change his profile, De Volkskrant newspaper reported. Gevers – who previously managed to log into Trump’s account in …

The Verge reports: Twitter is temporarily changing how you retweet ahead of the November 3rd US presidential election, to help prevent abuse and the spread of misinformation. Don’t worry, you’ll still be able to retweet. But until at least the end of election week, it won’t be quite as easy as usual to retweet something to all of your followers. …