Quotes of the Week

"We truly hadn't ever considered that people could just be really evil." [Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince in Gizmodo on 1 December 2017, on why this service provider company protects virulent neo-Nazi website The Daily Stormer]

"Some families, some communities, some cultures breed strife. Governments cannot always fix it. Compulsory contraception for those on benefits would help crack intergenerational reproduction of strife." [NewsCorp journalist and newly appointed  head of the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission, Gary Johns, in BuzzFeed, 19 May 2015]

What new and old media are saying about Malcolm Turnbull's train wreck of an NBN

Gizmodo, 27 November 2017

ITWire, 28 November 2017:

For months now, we've been told that fast broadband would be arriving sooner because of the change in technology that the Coalition Government decided upon, with HFC cable and fibre-to-the-node being the saviours of the project. Now that dream is unravelling.

The brakes have been well and truly slammed on by the NBN Co, with delays of six to nine months in getting any HFC connections up.

The Telstra HFC cable network is being shared by the NBN Co, Telstra and Foxtel; the NBN signal travels at a low frequency, the other two at higher frequencies. Apparently, at lower frequencies the signal does not travel all that well.

The equivalent of bandages will have to be applied. But the long-term solution will be to replace cable with fibre.

What was to have been a marathon — fibre-to-the-premises for 93%, satellite and fixed wireless for the rest — was attempted to be turned into a sprint by the agile and innovative Malcolm Turnbull.

Alas, the dream of the silver-haired visionary now seems to be dead.

His estimate of $29 billion, made in 2013, has doubled to $56 billion. His deadline of 2016 has blown out by four years. Even then, you do not know whether it will all be done.

And judging by the slow speeds on offer, the moment NBN Mark I is over, Mark II will have to start if Australia does not want to slip further into the dark ages. We are already behind countries that people here have not heard of.

All the documents that Turnbull put up on his website, claiming that the original plan would cost nearly $100 billion, have now disappeared.

Indeed, the man seems reluctant to even talk about the NBN. But that is par for the course for a politician who seems content if he can last the next 24 hours in his job. His motto seems to be taken from Holy Writ: "Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof."

Ignoring the advice of technically competent people, Turnbull sought to sell Australians on a plan that promised build speed and less expense.

With three years still remaining for the scheduled completion, it looks like the contents of a box of free-range eggs is all over that handsome visage.

But hey, why should he bother? After all, to use the magic-pudding language of NBN Co chief executive Bill Morrow, the HFC delay is merely "NBN Co taking (its) customer experience improvement programme to new levels".

Macro Business, 28 November 2017:

Customer anger over poor service has forced the Turnbull government to halt its broadband rollout to more than 250,000 households, fuelling growing concerns over the use of pay-TV cables to deliver high-speed internet.

The temporary delay means the NBN is certain to miss its revenue goals for this year and will struggle to meet its customer connection target by the time of the next election, turning the broadband rollout into a growing political dispute.

At issue is the use of hybrid fibre coaxial cable, or HFC, to offer broadband over the lines built in the 1990s to deliver the Optus Vision and Foxtel pay-TV networks. Malcolm Turnbull was a leading advocate for the use of existing HFC connections, upgraded over time, to deliver the NBN to millions of households more quickly than laying new ­optical fibre to every home.

NBN Co chief executive Bill Morrow yesterday put an immediate stop to new services being sold over the HFC footprint, conceding that the suspension was necessary to ensure homes could receive a reliable, quality service over the cable. The decision will see 250,000 homes that were set to receive their NBN connection via HFC put on hold for the next six to nine months.

ZD Net, 28 November 2017:

The pause in rolling out hybrid fibre-coaxial (HFC) by the National Broadband Network (NBN) is due to technical issues caused by HFC not being as mature a technology as fibre, satellite, and fixed-wireless, according to Communications Minister Mitch Fifield.

"What we have in the case of HFC is some technical issues. HFC as a technology isn't as mature as fibre to the node, or satellite, or fixed-wireless," Fifield said during Radio National Breakfast on Tuesday morning.

"With those other technologies in the initial rollout, there were issues to be worked through. That's the case with HFC, there's no problem that's been identified that can't be fixed, they will be fixed, and HFC is a terrific technology. It can get gigabit speeds, people will certainly be able to get 100 megabits per second.

"In the United States, most people who are on broadband are on the HFC pay TV cable network."

Despite referencing the prevalence of cable broadband in the US, however, Fifield's statements that HFC is not as mature a technology as fibre flies in the face of the fact that US providers have been offering cable broadband access since the late '90s.

Telstra additionally rolled out its HFC network in Australia around the same time.

Shadow Communications Minister Michelle Rowland has meanwhile argued that the delay could cost between AU$420 million and AU$790 million "based on analysis previously approved by the NBN board".

While NBN CEO Bill Morrow on Monday said it is too early to calculate such costs, Fifield remained adamant that the network issues can be repaired without the network having to be abandoned.

Via @SabraLane, 28 November 2017

The Australian, 27 November 2017:

TELSTRA is assessing the damage to its revenue forecasts after the company rolling out the national broadband network abruptly altered its plans.

The trouble-plagued NBN Co announced it was halting parts of the rollout that used the telco’s pay-TV cables.

Telstra is now working out how much of the $2.5 billion it was tipped to receive from NBN Co this year will be delayed.

NBN Co wants to connect about three million Australian houses to its network over the cables Telstra uses for Foxtel and broadband.

But it halted use of those cables yesterday amid a growing number of complaints about dropouts and other problems from customers who had switched to the NBN.

Gizmodo, 27 November 017:

As pointed out by Shadow Minister for Communications Michelle Rowland and Shadow Minister for Finance Jim Chambers, a seven month delay in HFC activations profile would have a $1 billion impact on rollout funding.

"On 24 May 2017, the Senate had NBN confirm the $1 billion figure was based on a seven month delay, for three million services, with an average revenue of $47 per month," the pair said in a join statement released today.

"It has now been revealed that problems with Turnbull's second-rate NBN could further delay the HFC rollout by 6 to 9 months for up to 2.5 million premises."

“Real name of of the National Broadband Network is No Bloody Network”

Anon

Australians to own their own banking, energy, phone and internet data? How wonderful! Except.....

Read the news coming out of Canberra…..

Assistant Minister for Cities and Digital Transformation and Liberal MP for Hume Angus Taylor, media release, 26 November 2017:

Australians to own their own banking, energy, phone and internet data

The Turnbull Government will legislate a national Consumer Data Right, allowing customers open access to their banking, energy, phone and internet transactions.

Australians will be able to compare offers, get access to cheaper products and plans to help them ‘make the switch’ and get greater value for money.

Assistant Minister for Cities and Digital Transformation Angus Taylor said it was the biggest reform to consumer law in a generation.

“Government is pursuing the very simple idea that the customer should own their own data. It is a powerful idea and a very important one,” Assistant Minister Taylor said.

“Australians have been missing out because it’s too hard to switch to something better. You may be able to access your recent banking transactions, or compare this quarter’s energy bill to the last, but it sure isn’t quick or easy to work out if you can get a better deal elsewhere.”

The Consumer Data Right was one of 41 recommendations from the Productivity Commission’s Data Availability and Use Inquiry, tabled in parliament in May this year.

The Government’s formal response to the inquiry will be published in coming weeks.

“It won’t be far down the track when you can simply tap your smartphone to switch from one bank to another, to a cheaper internet plan, or between energy companies.

Government is lifting the lid on competition in consumer services and technology is the enabler,” Assistant Minister Taylor said.

Following on from the Prime Minister’s recent agreement with electricity retailers, and the Treasurer’s open banking initiative, the Consumer Data Right will be established sector-by-sector, beginning in the banking, energy and telecommunications sectors.

Utilities will be required to provide standard, comparable, easy-to-read digital information, that third parties can readily access. New Commonwealth legislation to give effect to these reforms will be brought forward in 2018. [my yellow highlighting]

Take a minute to feel good about this.

Then realise that not all the publicly or privately held digital data retained about you will actually be ‘owned’ by you.

If anything it appears that individuals will have a limited joint right to certain data and what access to data they have will probably attract a fee to view and/or download.

It is also likely that data held about you by the banking, energy, phone and internet sectors will be transferred to third parties even when you prefer this didn't happen. It may become a condition of changing service providers as it will likely give the new provider a wealth of information about you and your credit rating.

It is also highly likely that the new legislation will allow third parties to access, disclose and trade in data sets and/or consumer data - without consumers necessarily being made aware this is occurring.

Eventually the Turnbull Government's consumer data rights along with those third party rights will apply to all sectors, including the insurance industry.

If you are interested in some background reading start with the Australian Productivity Commission’s March 2017 report here.

Can anyone believe anything Australian Human Services Minister Alan Tudge and his motley crew say?

The New Daily,  21 November 2017:

The Department of Human Services flagged the illegal sale of Medicare details on the dark web almost a fortnight before the illicit trade was exposed in a bombshell media report, The New Daily can exclusively reveal.

Internal emails, obtained under freedom of information laws, reveal that department officials discussed the security issue as early as June 22 – nearly two weeks before revelations that Medicare numbers were being sold online.

On July 4, The Guardian revealed that a dark web vendor was advertising the sale of any Australian’s Medicare number for the bitcoin equivalent of just $22 after exploiting a government system vulnerability.

In the wake of the revelations, Human Services Minister Alan Tudge said that he and his department had only learned of the illicit trade when contacted by a Guardian journalist on July 3.

However, high-priority correspondence within DHS shows that senior officials discussed the trade on the dark net, which is only accessible through a customised browser, nearly two weeks before it made the news.

On June 22, Rhonda Morris, national manager for serious non-compliance, raised the issue with Kate Buggy, national manager for internal fraud control and investigations, and Mark Withnell, general manager of business integrity, as well as several unnamed officials.

In a later email on July 3, Mr Withnell apparently connected The Guardian’s inquiries to the department’s earlier discussions on the issue, writing to colleagues: “This is the one I was mentioning last week.”

It is unclear exactly what DHS knew about the sale of Medicare details on the dark web prior to July’s media report.

Citing exemptions related to law enforcement and criminal investigations, the department redacted most of the content of the emails released to The New Daily.

It refused to release numerous other related emails entirely.

A DHS spokesman denied the department had knowledge of a specific breach in June and said its internal discussions had only related to general matters……

In September, DHS told the Senate that as many as 165 people may have had their Medicare numbers sold to unknown parties, although there had been no unauthorised access of any Australian’s health records.

Last month, a seperate review commissioned by the department recommended beefing up the authentication procedures required to access the online database used by healthcare professionals.

Although the AFP is continuing to investigate the source of the breach, the government has said it was likely the result of “traditional criminal activity” rather than a cyber attack.

In February, DHS was embroiled in controversy after it released the personal information of a Centrelink recipient to a journalist in order to diffuse claims she made in the media.

Oh dear, is the Turnbull Government asking chickens to visit the digital fox's den?

“The Turnbull Government has welcomed the eSafety Commissioner’s announcement today about the delivery of the pilot for a new national portal for reporting instances of non-consensual sharing of intimate images (colloquially known as image-based abuse or revenge pornography).”  [Senator Mitch Fifield, media release,15 October 2017]

Given the dubious reputation Facebook Inc has managed to garner in relation to business ethics, transparency, consumer privacy, e-safety, data mining and data breach history, one wonders what the Minister for Communications and Liberal Senator for Victoria Mitch Fifield was thinking.

Facebook Newsroom, 9 November 2017:

Image Pilot

By Antigone Davis, Global Head of Safety

We don’t want Facebook to be a place where people fear their intimate images will be shared without their consent. We’re constantly working to prevent this kind of abuse and keep this content out of our community. We recently announced a test that’s a little different from things we’ve tried in the past. Even though this is a small pilot, we want to be clear about how it works.

This past week, in partnership with the Australian eSafety Commissioner’s Office and an international working group of survivors, victim advocates and other experts, Facebook launched a limited pilot in Australia that will help prevent non-consensual intimate images from being posted and shared anywhere on Facebook, Messenger and Instagram. Specifically, Australians who fear their intimate image may be shared without their consent can work with the eSafety Commissioner to provide that image in a safe and secure way to Facebook so that we can help prevent it from being shared on our platforms.

To be clear, people can already report if their intimate images have been shared on our platform without their consent, and we will remove and hash them to help prevent further sharing on our platform. With this new small pilot, we want to test an emergency option for people to provide a photo proactively to Facebook, so it never gets shared in the first place. This program is completely voluntary. It’s a protective measure that can help prevent a much worse scenario where an image is shared more widely. We look forward to getting feedback and learning.

Here’s how it works:

* Australians can complete an online form on the eSafety Commissioner’s official website.

* To establish which image is of concern, people will be asked to send the image to themselves on Messenger.

* The eSafety Commissioner’s office notifies us of the submission (via their form). However, they do not have access to the actual image.

* Once we receive this notification, a specially trained representative from our Community Operations team reviews and hashes the image, which creates a human-unreadable, numerical fingerprint of it.

* We store the photo hash—not the photo—to prevent someone from uploading the photo in the future. If someone tries to upload the image to our platform, like all photos on Facebook, it is run through a database of these hashes and if it matches we do not allow it to be posted or shared.

* Once we hash the photo, we notify the person who submitted the report via the secure email they provided to the eSafety Commissioner’s office and ask them to delete the photo from the Messenger thread on their device. Once they delete the image from the thread, we will delete the image from our servers……..

Political Cartoon of the Week

@roweafr

Question Time in the Australian House of Representatives reveals the arbitrary nature and downright absurdity of the National Broadband Network rollout

In Australia where the dead have better Internet access than the living……

Hansard, 16 October 2017:

Ms McBRIDE (Dobell) (14:53): My question is to the Prime Minister. We are now in the fifth year of this Prime Minister's mismanagement of the NBN. Is the Prime Minister aware that students at the Central Coast Rudolf Steiner School in Fountaindale can't connect to the NBN, even though Fountaindale has supposedly had the NBN since September last year? What sort of incompetence means that the cemetery behind the school has an NBN connection but the school doesn't? [my yellow highlighting]

Mr TURNBULL (Wentworth—Prime Minister) (14:54): I thank the honourable member for her question. I'm certainly happy, if she's able to raise the specific customer's details with me, to make sure it goes to the minister and to NBN Co. What I can say, if honourable members care to pay attention to the NBN's weekly rollout report, which I do—an example of transparency on the part of my government which had no counterpart under the Labor Party, I might say—is that every week the numbers go up, and there are currently over six million premises that are able to connect, and just under three million have services that are connected. So the rollout is going at great pace, and I'm sure the matter that the honourable member has raised will be able to be dealt with.

Twitter shows its heart is as dark as Facebook's when it comes to Donald Trump

As a businessman, television ‘personality', presidential candidate and now US president, Donald J. Trump has always used his Twitter account @realDonaldTrump to boast, misinform, openly lie, insult, incite, personally attack, defame and threaten.

Over the seven years his main account has been in existence I know of no instance where Twitter Inc has sanctioned this account for breaking its participation rules.

Having deliberately used this digital megaphone to bring the world closer to a nuclear war in 2017, Trump remains immune regardless.

It would appear that, like Zuckerberg and Facebook Inc, CEO Jack Dorsey and Twitter 
shareholders have been more concerned with profit margins than the harm they are enabling. 

In Twitter's case by allowing Trump to tweet with no genuine consideration by the company of a tweet’s context or content.

THREAD: Some of you have been asking why we haven't taken down the Tweet mentioned here: https://t.co/CecwG0qHmq 1/6

— Twitter PublicPolicy (@Policy) September 25, 2017

Associated Press,

WASHINGTON (AP) — Twitter cited President Donald Trump’s “newsworthiness” and the public interest as reasons why it declined to remove a tweet that added to the fiery rhetoric between the United States and North Korea.

Trump tweeted Saturday : “Just heard Foreign Minister of North Korea speak at U.N. If he echoes thoughts of Little Rocket Man, they won’t be around much longer!” On Monday, North Korea’s top diplomat called the tweet a declaration of war. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders responded by calling the suggestion of such a declaration “absurd.”

Twitter’s rules state users “may not make threats of violence or promote violence, including threatening or promoting terrorism.”

The company responded to questions about why Trump’s tweet wasn’t removed Monday by posting in a series of messages on its public policy account that “newsworthiness” is one of the factors it considers in determining if a tweet breaks the platform’s rules.

“This has long been internal policy and we’ll soon update our public-facing rules to reflect it,” one message read. “We need to do better on this, and will.”

The company also stated it’s “committed to transparency and keeping people informed about what’s happening in the world.”

Calls on the company to curtail Trump’s use of the platform are not new . The company has said in the past that it doesn’t comment on individual accounts, but it has cited the importance of hearing from leadership in order to hold people accountable.

Trump’s account wasn’t affected in July, when Twitter announced that it was taking action, including suspensions, on 10 times the number of abusive accounts than it did a year before.

Excerpt from The Twitter Rules:

Abusive Behavior

We believe in freedom of expression and in speaking truth to power, but that means little as an underlying philosophy if voices are silenced because people are afraid to speak up. In order to ensure that people feel safe expressing diverse opinions and beliefs, we do not tolerate behavior that crosses the line into abuse, including behavior that harasses, intimidates, or uses fear to silence another user’s voice.

Any accounts and related accounts engaging in the activities specified below may be temporarily locked and/or subject to permanent suspension.

Violent threats (direct or indirect): You may not make threats of violence or promote violence, including threatening or promoting terrorism.

Harassment: You may not incite or engage in the targeted abuse or harassment of others. Some of the factors that we may consider when evaluating abusive behavior include:

if a primary purpose of the reported account is to harass or send abusive messages to others;

if the reported behavior is one-sided or includes threats;

if the reported account is inciting others to harass another account; and

if the reported account is sending harassing messages to an account from multiple accounts.

Hateful conduct: You may not promote violence against or directly attack or threaten other people on the basis of race, ethnicity, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, religious affiliation, age, disability, or disease. We also do not allow accounts whose primary purpose is inciting harm towards others on the basis of these categories. 

The Charlottesville incidents to which US President Donald J. Trump gives tacit support - WARNING: violent and disturbing images

https://youtu.be/P54sP0Nlngg

The Sydney Morning Herald, 16 August 2017:

He [President Trump] argued that both sides had been guilty of violence, he noted that the white supremacists indeed had a permit to protest, but the "other group" did not. He insisted that both sides had "bad people" and "very fine people" and he drew an equivalency between George Washington, who help create the United States after the American Revolutionary War that ended in 1783, and General Robert E. Lee, who led the secessionist armies that killed more American troops than any other foe in the defence of slavery nearly a century later.

The political and media response afterwards was immediate and shocked. Again Republican leaders were forced to come out to rebuke and distance themselves from their ostensible leader. In a long Twitter statement Marco Rubio declared, "Mr President, you can't allow #WhiteSupremacists to share only part of blame. They support idea which cost nation & world so much pain."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I suspect that the reaction to "Unite The Right Rally" marches in Charlottesville is not what Neo-Nazi, Klu Klux Klan and other hate groups were expecting

From 11 to 12 August 2017 extreme right wing groups gathered in Charlottesville, Virginia USA to participate in a two-day rally. Counter protesters also gathered over that same time period.

By the evening of 12 August two police officers and one counter protester were dead and at least twenty counter protesters were wounded.

Unite The Right march participant……

"We are stepping off the Internet in a big way. For instance last night at the Torch Log there were hundreds and hundreds of us. People realised they are not atomised individuals, they are part of a larger whole. Because we have been spreading our memes, we have been organising on the Internet and now they are coming out and now as you can see today we greatly outnumbered the anti-white, anti-American filth and at some point we will have enough power that we will clear them from the streets forever. That which is degenerate in white countries will be removed. We are starting to slowly unveil a little bit of our power level – you ain't seen nothin yet." [Robert "Azzmador" Ray, feature writer at The Daily Stormer, video, 12 August 2017]

Reaction to the white supremacist violence……

The white supremacist who helped lead the Charlottesville rally has been banned from Facebook

Facebook has banned the Facebook and Instagram accounts of a white nationalist who attended the rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that ended in deadly violence.

Facebook spokeswoman Ruchika Budhraja told the Associated Press on Wednesday that the profile pages of Christopher Cantwell have been removed as well as a page connected to his podcast..

The Daily Caller Removes 'Unite the Right' Organizer Jason Kessler's Bylines From Web Site

As of 14 August 2017, Daily Caller —  a conservative web site with a twin nonprofit organization — has scrubbed its site of articles by Jason Kessler, the white supremacist who was an organizer of a deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia the weekend before. 

Daily Stormer jumps to dark web while Reddit and Facebook ban hate groups

GoDaddy – the internet domain registrar and web hosting service – and Google cancelled the Daily Stormer's domain name registration on Sunday, saying they prohibit clients from using their sites to incite violence. The Daily Stormer helped organise the violent neo-Nazi gathering in Charlottesville, Virginia, on Saturday at which a civil rights activist died.

Twitter is joining its fellow tech companies in clamping down on the Daily Stormer, a neo-Nazi website

On Twitter, the Daily Stormer's feed is no longer visible; instead, the page on Wednesday afternoon reflects its account has been "suspended." A spokesperson for Twitter said the company could not comment on individual users, but added: "The Twitter Rules prohibit violent threats, harassment, hateful conduct, and multiple account abuse, and we will take action on accounts violating those policies."

Why We Terminated Daily Stormer

Earlier today, Cloudflare terminated the account of the Daily Stormer. We've stopped proxying their traffic and stopped answering DNS requests for their sites. We've taken measures to ensure that they cannot sign up for Cloudflare's services ever again.

US companies crack down on key services for hate groups

US companies are blocking hate groups from key services such as payments, cyber security defences and social media sites after the violence in Charlottesville, despite questions over the consequences for freedom of speech. Leading payment and credit card groups MasterCard, American Express, Discover Financial Services and Visa have joined Silicon Valley companies Twitter and Cloudflare to become the latest corporations to try to block neo-Nazis' access to funds and the internet. Several of the payments companies added they did not ban the use of their services because the customers expressed offensive views — but because they violated their terms of service or incited violence.

Trump Dissolves Business Advisory Councils as CEOs Quit

Most leaders on the councils thought Trump's statement on Monday, in which he condemned the hate groups by name, was sufficient. But they were furious and disgusted with Trump's follow-up remarks on Tuesday, according to the offices of two CEOs.

By Tuesday night, at least nine members decided to drop out individually, and reached out to Schwarzman, who then proposed dismantling the council entirely.

A dozen members of that strategy and policy council participated in a conference call Wednesday, during which they all agreed to dissolve the group, the people close to the decision said. Schwarzman then notified the White House. And after that, Trump tweeted that he was "ending both" advisory councils. The business leaders had expected that Trump would portray the developments as his own decision, the sources said

Matt Talhelm‏ @MattTalhelm

#BREAKING: #Cville car suspect, #UniteTheRight rally organizer, & alt-right leaders face $3M lawsuit from 2 ppl injured in car attack

RELATED POST

North Coast Voices, The United States of America under Trump - the ugly picture. Part Two

Digital Transformation Agency: of all the stupid ideas.....

Of all the stupid ideas this has to be one of the worst…….

The Courier Mail, 5 August 2017:

ONE super ID logon that will allow Australians to interact with Medicare, pay their car registration, help switch banks and buy groceries and clothes online is being developed by the Turnbull Government.

In a bid to stop identity fraud and increase competition, Digital Transformation Assistant Minister Angus Taylor revealed the blueprint centred on one user name and one password for government and private use.

Within five years, Australians may be able to order a pair of jeans online or update their address for Centrelink, their bank or energy providers by using the streamlining technology provided by the government.

The opt-in plan will give people the ability to have one logon and password, which will not be stored centrally to ensure security.

It will likely have a twostep verification process, including a text of a code being sent to a mobile phone.

He said the first step was a logon for all government agencies, which could happen reasonably quickly, and then expanding it to the private sector.

Mr Taylor said conversations were being held with states and territories and some significant private companies.

“It’s opt-in, that’s the crucial principle. Mistakes of the past were forcing people down a particular track,” he said, stressing that there would be no “number” given to Australians and it was not a version of dumped policy of an Australia Card.

He said the measure would also make it easier to change banks or open bank accounts because the Government logon would eventually be considered one of the best identification systems.

“If you update your address, you’ll only have to do it once (and it will go to all government agencies and online retailers).”

He called it the “tell us once” principle.

Yes indeed; one phishing email, re-direct hack, one malicious website or insecure mobile phone and in the space of five minutes your identity is not your own, money leaves your bank accounts or money is borrowed against your assets and your credit card notches up thousands of dollars in goods that someone else receives.

What a brill idea, Angus! Did Malcolm suggest it?

Facebook Inc still pursuing dream of spying on users through their webcams and via their touch screens or mobile phones

The Daily Dot, 8 June 2017:

Your worst internet nightmare could be on its way to becoming a reality.

A newly discovered patent application shows Facebook has come up with plans to potentially spy on its users through their phone or laptop cameras—even when they’re not turned on. This could allow it to send tailored advertisements to its nearly two billion members. The application, filed in 2014, says Facebook has thought of using “imaging components,” like a camera, to read the emotions of its users and send them catered content, like videos, photos, and ads.

“Computing devices such as laptops, mobile phones, and tablets increasingly include at least one, and often more than one, imaging component, such as a digital camera. Some devices may include a front-facing camera that is positioned on the same side of the device as a display. Thus, during normal operation, a user may be looking towards the imaging component. However, current content delivery systems typically do not utilize passive imaging information. Thus, a need exists for a content delivery solution that takes advantage of available passive imaging data to provide content to a user with improved relevancy.”

This is the US patent application to which the article is referring.

TECHNIQUES FOR EMOTION DETECTION AND CONTENT DELIVERY

United States Patent Application 20150242679

Kind Code:

A1

Techniques for emotion detection and content delivery are described. In one embodiment, for example, an emotion detection component may identify at least one type of emotion associated with at least one detected emotion characteristic. A storage component may store the identified emotion type. An application programming interface (API) component may receive a request from one or more applications for emotion type and, in response to the request, return the identified emotion type. The one or more applications may identify content for display based upon the identified emotion type. The identification of content for display by the one or more applications based upon the identified emotion type may include searching among a plurality of content items, each content item being associated with one or more emotion type. Other embodiments are described and claimed.

Publication number	US20150242679 A1
Publication type	Application
Application number	US 14/189,467
Publication date	Aug 27, 2015
Filing date	Feb 25, 2014
Priority date	Feb 25, 2014
Also published as	US9681166
Inventors	Barak Reuven Naveh
Original Assignee	Facebook, Inc.
Export Citation	BiBTeX, EndNote, RefMan
Patent Citations (9), Referenced by (2), Classifications (6),Legal Events (1)
External Links: USPTO, USPTO Assignment, Espacenet

Facebook Inc appears to have been granted this related patent, Techniques for emotion detection and content delivery (US 9681166 B2- Publication date 13 June 2017):

ABSTRACT

Techniques for emotion detection and content delivery are described. In one embodiment, for example, an emotion detection component may identify at least one type of emotion associated with at least one detected emotion characteristic. A storage component may store the identified emotion type. An application programming interface (API) component may receive a request from one or more applications for emotion type and, in response to the request, return the identified emotion type. The one or more applications may identify content for display based upon the identified emotion type. The identification of content for display by the one or more applications based upon the identified emotion type may include searching among a plurality of content items, each content item being associated with one or more emotion type. Other embodiments are described and claimed.

BACKGROUND

Users of computing devices spend increasing amounts of time browsing streams of posts on social networks, news articles, video, audio, or other digital content. The amount of information available to users is also increasing. Thus, a need exists for delivering content a user that may be of current interest to them. For example, a user's interests may be determined based upon their current emotional state. Computing devices such as laptops, mobile phones, and tablets increasingly include at least one, and often more than one, imaging component, such as a digital camera. Some devices may include a front-facing camera that is positioned on the same side of the device as a display. Thus, during normal operation, a user may be looking towards the imaging component. However, current content delivery systems typically do not utilize passive imaging information. Thus, a need exists for a content delivery solution that takes advantage of available passive imaging data to provide content to a user with improved relevancy.

Facebook also appears to have been granted a US patent in May this year for Augmenting Text Messages With Emotion Information (US 20170147202 A1).

According to CBINSIGHTS this patent would; automatically add emotional information to text messages, predicting the user’s emotion based on methods of keyboard input. The visual format of the text message would adapt in real time based on the user’s predicted emotion. As the patent notes (and as many people have likely experienced), it can be hard to convey mood and intended meaning in a text-only message; this system would aim to reduce misunderstandings.

The system could pick up data from the keyboard, mouse, touch pad, touch screen, or other input devices, and the patent mentions predicting emotion based on relative typing speed, how hard the keys are pressed, movement (using the phone’s accelerometer), location, and other factors.