Australia threatens fines for social media giants enabling misinformation

The bill is part of a wide-ranging regulatory crackdown by Australia, where leaders have complained that foreign-domiciled tech platforms are overriding the country’s sovereignty. (AFP/File)
The bill is part of a wide-ranging regulatory crackdown by Australia, where leaders have complained that foreign-domiciled tech platforms are overriding the country’s sovereignty. (AFP/File)
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Updated 12 September 2024
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Australia threatens fines for social media giants enabling misinformation

Australia threatens fines for social media giants enabling misinformation
  • Breaches face fines up to 5 percent of global revenue
  • Bill seeks to prevent election, public health disinformation

SYDNEY: Australia said it will fine Internet platforms up to 5 percent of their global revenue for failing to prevent the spread of misinformation online, joining a worldwide push to rein in borderless tech giants but angering free speech advocates.
The government said it would make tech platforms set codes of conduct governing how they stop dangerous falsehoods spreading, to be approved by a regulator. The regulator would set its own standard if a platform failed to do so, then fine companies for non-compliance.
The legislation, to be introduced in parliament on Thursday, targets false content that hurts election integrity or public health, calls for denouncing a group or injuring a person, or risks disrupting key infrastructure or emergency services.
The bill is part of a wide-ranging regulatory crackdown by Australia, where leaders have complained that foreign-domiciled tech platforms are overriding the country’s sovereignty, and comes ahead of a federal election due within a year.
Already Facebook owner Meta has said it may block professional news content if it is forced to pay royalties, while X, formerly Twitter, has removed most content moderation since being bought by billionaire Elon Musk in 2022.
“Misinformation and disinformation pose a serious threat to the safety and wellbeing of Australians, as well as to our democracy, society and economy,” said Communications Minister Michelle Rowland in a statement.
“Doing nothing and allowing this problem to fester is not an option.”
An initial version of the bill was criticized in 2023 for giving the Australian Communications and Media Authority too much power to determine what constituted misinformation and disinformation, the term for intentionally spreading lies.
Rowland said the new bill specified the media regulator would not have power to force the takedown of individual pieces of content or user accounts. The new version of the bill protected professional news, artistic and religious content, while it did not protect government-authorized content.
Some four-fifths of Australians wanted the spread of misinformation addressed, the minister said, citing the Australian Media Literary Alliance.
Meta, which counts nearly nine in 10 Australians as Facebook users, declined to comment. Industry body DIGI, of which Meta is a member, said the new regime reinforced an anti-misinformation code it last updated in 2022, but many questions remained.
X was not immediately available for comment.
Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson said that while he had yet to examine the revised bill, “Australians’ legitimately-held political beliefs should not be censored by either the government, or by foreign social media platforms.”
The Australia Communications and Media Authority said it welcomed “legislation to provide it with a formal regulatory role to combat misinformation and disinformation on digital platforms.”


Advertising network TBWA is committed to ‘building a future’ in Saudi Arabia, says global CEO

Advertising network TBWA is committed to ‘building a future’ in Saudi Arabia, says global CEO
Updated 03 October 2024
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Advertising network TBWA is committed to ‘building a future’ in Saudi Arabia, says global CEO

Advertising network TBWA is committed to ‘building a future’ in Saudi Arabia, says global CEO
  • Earlier this year, parent company Omnicom announced its MidEast RHQ will be based in Riyadh

DUBAI: Creative advertising network TBWA and its parent company Omnicom are looking forward to reinforcing their presence in Saudi Arabia, said Troy Ruhanen, global CEO of TBWA.

“We’re committing to really building a future there (Saudi Arabia),” which included working with more local clients and developing Saudi talent, he said during a recent visit to the Middle East, including Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

From Jan. 1, 2025, Ruhanen will serve as the global CEO of the newly formed organization Omnicom Advertising Group, which brings together the group’s creative and advertising agencies and networks BBDO, DDB, TBWA, Goodby Silverstein & Partners, Zimmerman, and others.

As he prepares for the new role, Ruhanen said that he is eager to explore the (Saudi) marketplace” from both perspectives: TBWA’s to finish the year and Omnicom Advertising Group’s to look at possibilities for next year. 

This June, as a testament to its commitment to the Kingdom, Omnicom announced the establishment of a Middle East regional headquarters in Riyadh, bringing together 10 Omnicom agency brands including BBDO, DDB, TBWA, OMD, PHD, Hearts and Science, and FleishmanHillard.

Currently, TBWA has a mix of local and international talent in Saudi Arabia, partly owing to global clients, because “there are people who are more familiar with those global clients right now,” Ruhanen said. 

However, he added that the network plans “to grow a very locally informed, local leadership kind of base. 

“We know that’s our destiny, and it’s just a matter of making sure that we plan ourselves and transition ourselves to that right place.” 

TBWA has several proprietary platforms and units such as Backslash, self-described as a cultural intelligence unit; NEXT, a global innovation practice based on analytics and strategy; and the Collective AI Platform to harness the power of artificial intelligence for employees and clients.

Launched in June, Collective AI is a suite of generative AI services powered by partnerships with the likes of Microsoft, Adobe and Google.

“AI is not meant to be an answer machine,” but rather “a catalyst for original thinking,” Ruhanen said.

The platform has been built by feeding in various strategies, case studies, and so on, to make it a more “informed practice,” he said. 

In terms of the adoption of AI, Ruhanen said there were some “mature corporations” that understood the current boundaries of AI such as regulation and privacy, and there are others who “want to talk about how they’re doing all of these things all at once.”

TBWA’s priority was to protect its clients while also experimenting, within legal boundaries, to see what was possible, he said.

The conversation around AI tended to be dominated by the idea of efficiency and speeding up the creative process, which was the wrong way of looking at it, he said.

He added: “It’s about enabling a better, more accurate, and more informed way of working, (which) is giving us the best place to launch our creative minds and come up with the original solutions that no one has ever seen.

“It can’t be about an efficiency mindset; it has got to be about a growth mindset.”

Addressing concerns about AI’s threat to human talent, Ruhanen recounted a 1994 article by technology magazine WIRED with the headline “Is Advertising Dead?” Over the years, there have been several such articles questioning the role of advertising and agencies in an increasingly digital world.

However, in the past three decades, advertising agencies have “grown tremendously,” he said.

AI will not replace human talent or creative agencies, but will “change the nature of how we operate and the skills we’re going to require,” which means there will be a shift “from a service mindset to much more of a strategic mindset,” Ruhanen said.

“A lot of people have predicted what the future of this business is going to look like, and they’ve been sorely wrong for many years,” he said.


Israel releases Palestinian journalist after 6 months in detention

Israel releases Palestinian journalist after 6 months in detention
Updated 03 October 2024
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Israel releases Palestinian journalist after 6 months in detention

Israel releases Palestinian journalist after 6 months in detention
  • Asmaa Harish was among dozens of reporters held under administrative detention by Israeli authorities

LONDON: Israeli authorities on Wednesday released Palestinian journalist Asmaa Harish, according to local media reports, after she had spent six months in administrative detention at Damon Prison.

Harish was detained in April without charge or trial under the practice of administrative detention, which Israeli authorities often use for “security reasons.”

The Palestinian Prisoners’ Club, a Ramallah-based human rights organization, said that Harish was among more than 80 Palestinian journalists who had been imprisoned and subjected to ill-treatment and rights violations since Oct. 7 last year.

The group added that dozens of Palestinian journalists remain in Israeli custody, including six women who continue to be arbitrarily detained.

Damon Prison, which is located near Haifa, has been criticized by humanitarian organizations for holding Palestinian detainees and undocumented migrant workers in “inhumane conditions.”

The facility was temporarily closed in 2000 following mounting concerns about the treatment of prisoners.

The prisoner support group Addameer in 2023 reported little evidence of “significant changes or improvements” in the prison’s conditions since the 1950s.


Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing

Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing
Updated 03 October 2024
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Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing

Belgian journalists injured in Beirut bombing
  • Israel has been carrying out a bombing campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon and has also sent its troops across the border
  • The bombardments in Lebanon have cost more than 1,000 lives

Brussels: Two Belgian journalists were injured in Lebanon while reporting on overnight air raids in Beirut, their employer said Thursday, as fighting raged between Israel and Hezbollah.
VTM correspondent Robin Ramaekers suffered facial injuries and cameraman Stijn De Smet was being treated for a leg wound, said a statement by the broadcaster’s parent company, DPG Media.
“Last night there was a bombing in central Beirut. When Robin and Stijn wanted to run a report on that, they got injured,” the firm said, adding the pair were being treated in hospital.
“Both are now in safety and are being cared for.”
The circumstances of the incident were not yet clear, the company said. Belgium’s foreign ministry said it was closely monitoring the situation.
Israel has been carrying out a bombing campaign against Hezbollah in Lebanon and has also sent its troops across the border.
On Thursday, the Israeli military pounded Beirut with overnight air raids. A total of 17 strikes had hit the capital by dawn, Lebanon’s official National News Agency (NNA) reported.
One of the strikes hit a Hezbollah rescue facility, a source close to the group told AFP, killing at least six people, according to a Lebanese health ministry toll.
Israel says it is trying to secure its border with Lebanon so tens of thousands of Israelis displaced by nearly a year of hostilities with Hezbollah can return home.
The bombardments in Lebanon have cost more than 1,000 lives and seen Hezbollah’s long-time chief Hassan Nasrallah killed.
Authorities in Lebanon say that around a million people have been displaced.
Last year, a journalist was killed and six other reporters, including two from AFP, wounded by Israeli shelling while covering the cross-border fighting in southern Lebanon.


Google Doodle celebrates Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup in the UAE

Google Doodle celebrates Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup in the UAE
Updated 03 October 2024
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Google Doodle celebrates Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup in the UAE

Google Doodle celebrates Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup in the UAE

DUBAI: The latest Google Doodle marks the ninth edition of the ICC Women’s T20 Cricket World Cup, which is being hosted in the UAE.

Ten teams comprising the world’s top female cricketers are divided into two for the group stages, with the top two from each advancing to the knockout semifinals. The victors will battle it out for the title.

Reigning champions Australia are aiming to add a seventh trophy to their collection, while newcomers Scotland are hoping their first-ever appearance in the tournament will result in them taking home the trophy.

The competition was transferred to the UAE from Bangladesh after the South Asian country was hit by political turmoil and domestic instability just months before the tournament was due to open.

A total of 23 games will be played in Sharjah and Dubai, with the final scheduled for Oct. 20.

Bangladesh, who retain hosting rights, kick off the event on Thursday against Scotland in Sharjah. Pakistan will play Sri Lanka at the same venue in the evening.

Defending champions Australia are in Group A along with India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and New Zealand, while Group B features South Africa, England, the West Indies, Bangladesh and Scotland.

Australia, who have twice won three in a row, will be mindful of the threat posed by India

The 2023 semifinalists — they lost to Australia in Cape Town — have improved greatly, thanks in large part to the Indian Women’s Premier League. The league was formed to provide a platform for India’s female cricketers to express themselves and gain in stature.

– with AP


X agrees to pay Brazil fines, court orders finances unblocked

X agrees to pay Brazil fines, court orders finances unblocked
Updated 02 October 2024
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X agrees to pay Brazil fines, court orders finances unblocked

X agrees to pay Brazil fines, court orders finances unblocked
  • High-profile judge Moraes has been engaged in a long feud with Tesla and SpaceX owner Musk as part of his drive to crack down on disinformation in Brazil

RIO DE JANEIRO: A Brazilian judge on Tuesday ordered the unblocking of the bank accounts of Elon Musk’s X in the country after the social media platform agreed to pay more than $5 million in fines.
The ruling by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes paves the way for the suspension of X to be lifted in Brazil, where it has been off-limits to users since August 31 in a standoff over disinformation between the judge and Musk.
Moraes ordered X shut down in Latin America’s biggest country after Musk refused to remove dozens of right-wing accounts and then failed to name a new legal representative in the country as ordered.
In his latest decision, the judge ordered Brazil’s central bank to unblock X’s bank accounts so it can receive transfers and “immediately make payment of the fines indicated.”
X had informed the court it would pay fines to the tune of some $5.2 million, according to the ruling.
High-profile judge Moraes has been engaged in a long feud with Tesla and SpaceX owner Musk as part of his drive to crack down on disinformation in Brazil.
The clash between the Brazilian court and the billionaire has morphed into a high-stakes tussle testing the limits of both freedom of expression and corporate responsibility in South America’s largest country.
X had more than 22 million users in Brazil before the ban, which was put into place on August 31.
The company has in the last week started complying with the Brazilian court’s conditions to get reactivated.
Musk has repeatedly hit out at Moraes in social media posts, calling him an “evil dictator” and dubbing him “Voldemort” after the villain from the “Harry Potter” series.