Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen detailed the internal documents she gathered showing negative impacts from the company’s products and urged lawmakers to consider tougher regulations. Photo: Stefani Reynolds/Bloomberg News
“Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen on Tuesday told lawmakers that the company systematically and repeatedly prioritized profits over the safety of its users, painting a detailed picture of an organization where hunger to grow governed decisions, with little concern for the impact on society.
Her Senate committee testimony — based on her experience working for the company’s civic integrity division and thousands of documents she took with her before leaving in May — sought to highlight what she called a structure of incentivization, created by Facebook’s leadership and implemented throughout the company. By directing resources away from important safety programs and encouraging platform tweaks to fuel growth, these performance metrics dictated operations, Haugen said, a design that encouraged political divisions, mental health harms and even violence.
She pointed to Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg as the enforcer of this system, arguing that he controls the most important decisions made at the company.
‘Until the incentives change, Facebook will not change. Left alone, Facebook will continue to make choices that go against the common good, our common good,’ she said.
The hearing signaled the start of a new crisis for Facebook in Washington, galvanizing lawmakers around regulatory efforts to tamp down on what they say is a wide-ranging set of the societal ills prompted by the social media giant. Repeatedly, senators compared the company to Big Tobacco, purveyors of products that are addictive and profitable but ultimately bad. The Tobacco industry was ultimately contained by landmark regulation, an action lawmakers promised to replicate.
‘I think the time has come for action, and I think you are the catalyst for that action,’ Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) told Haugen during the hearing.
The Senate panel hearing was Haugen’s first public appearance after she revealed herself Sunday evening as the source of thousands of pages of internal company research, leaked to the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Wall Street Journal. Throughout, Haugen gave a detailed account of the ways that Facebook employees are incentivized to turn a blind eye from the problems its services were causing, coupling her own experiences at the company with data from the internal Facebook documents she took with her.
Already revelations from the documents Haugen leaked have intensified concerns on Capitol Hill about Facebook’s influence, particularly on children’s and teens’ mental health, a topic expected to be the key focus of the hearing. But Haugen and lawmakers covered huge swaths of ground, touching on national security risks, the spread of misinformation and the deadly mob attack on the Capitol on Jan. 6.
Congress is not as clueless about Facebook as it seems
As she was speaking, Facebook’s representatives tweeted and emailed talking points rebutting Haugen’s testimony. One of their main points: Haugen didn’t work on many of the issues, including teenagers and child safety, that were covered in the documents that she downloaded. Lena Pietsch, Facebook director of policy communications, said Haugen clarified her testimony at least six times to point out that she had not worked on the subject matter in question.” Read more at Washington Post
“As Congress faces the threat of a debt ceiling crisis, the Senate is scheduled to vote on a procedural rule Wednesday that would allow a measure suspending the debt limit until December 2022 to reach the floor for a vote. However, if anyone objects to that rule, it would require 60 votes to overcome the filibuster – a tall order considering there are only 50 Democrats in the Senate and no Republicans have indicated they would join them. Earlier this week, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell warned President Joe Biden in a letter to pursue a different course on raising the debt limit. Although the two haven't spoken about the letter, White House Deputy Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said that Biden ‘is always open to having conversation.’” Read more at USA Today
“Democrats in a flurry of private talks are beginning to narrow their differences over the size of President Biden’s sweeping safety-net bill, as liberals signal sizable concessions on the size of what could be the most far-reaching social legislation in years.
In a virtual meeting with about a dozen liberal Democrats on Monday, Biden suggested a range of $1.9 trillion to $2.2 trillion, according to people with knowledge of the private discussion — significantly lower than his initial $3.5 trillion plan.
Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), leader of the influential Congressional Progressive Caucus, pushed back, according to three of the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. She countered with a minimum spending amount of $2.5 trillion, saying a range from that figure to $2.9 trillion could cover key programs.
Still, the gap between the $2.2 trillion maximum offered by Biden and the $2.5 trillion minimum suggested by Jayapal represents a striking narrowing of differences from just last week.
It is unclear whether Democratic centrists like Sens. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia and Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona would agree to a figure in this range, but Biden has been in frequent contact with them in recent days and has suggested he knows what they would accept.
Meanwhile, other influential progressives such as Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) have continued to lobby for the $3.5 trillion figure.” Read more at Washington Post
“VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis expressed ‘shame’ for himself and the Roman Catholic Church on Wednesday for the scale of child sexual abuse within the church in France and acknowledged failures in putting the needs of victims first.
The pope spoke during his regular audience at the Vatican about a report released Tuesday that estimated some 330,000 French children were abused by clergy and other church authority figures dating back to 1950.” Read more at AP News
“The Justice Department is reviewing its decision not to charge FBI agents who failed to properly investigate sex abuse allegations leveled against Larry Nassar, the disgraced former USA Gymnastics doctor who sexually abused his patients, including world-famous gymnasts.
Deputy Attorney General Lisa O. Monaco made the announcement at a hearing Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Lawmakers on the panel have sharply criticized the Justice Department for not pursuing false-statements charges against a supervisory FBI agent and his boss for what the agency’s inspector general concluded were lies to internal investigators to cover up their failures.” Read more at Washington Post
“LONG BEACH, Calif. (AP) — A ship’s anchor may have hooked, dragged and torn an underwater pipeline that spilled tens of thousands of gallons of crude oil into the ocean off Southern California, according to federal investigators who also found the pipeline owner didn’t quickly shut down operations after a safety system alerted to a possible spill.
Questions remained about the timeline of the weekend spill, which fouled beaches and a protected marshland, potentially closing them for weeks along with commercial and recreational fishing in a major hit to the local economy.
Some reports of a possible spill, a petroleum smell and an oily sheen on the waters off Huntington Beach came in Friday night but weren’t corroborated and the pipeline’s operator, Amplify Energy Corp., didn’t report a spill until the next morning, authorities said.
An alarm went off in a company control room at 2:30 a.m. Saturday that pressure had dropped in the pipeline, indicating a possible leak but Amplify waited until 6:01 a.m. to shut down the pipeline, according to preliminary findings of an investigation into the spill.” Read more at AP News
“The Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded on Wednesday to Benjamin List and David W.C. MacMillan for their development of a new tool to build molecules, work that has spurred advances in pharmaceutical research and lessened the impact of chemistry on the environment.
Their work, while unseen by consumers, is an essential part in many leading industries and is vital for research.
Chemists are among those tasked with constructing molecules that can form elastic and durable materials, store energy in batteries or inhibit the progression of diseases.
But that work requires catalysts, which are substances that control and accelerate chemical reactions without becoming part of the final product….
The problem was that there were just two types of catalysts available: metals and enzymes.
In 2000, Dr. List and Dr. MacMillan — working independently of each other — developed a third type of catalysis.
It is called asymmetric organocatalysis and builds upon small organic molecules….
Dr. MacMillan is a Scottish chemist and a professor at Princeton University, where he also headed the department of chemistry from 2010 to 2015. He earned his Ph.D. in inorganic chemistry at the University of California, Irvine, in 1996 before accepting a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University. His research has focused on innovative concepts in synthetic organic chemistry.
Dr. List is a German chemist, born in Frankfurt, and director at the Max Planck Institute for Coal Research in Mülheim an der Ruhr, Germany. He received his Ph.D. in 1997 from Goethe University Frankfurt, before he was appointed to work as an assistant professor at the Scripps Research Institute in California. He is also an honorary professor at the University of Cologne, in Germany.” Read more at New York Times
“The Biden administration is expected to overhaul a student-loan forgiveness program that would make it easier for more public-sector workers to qualify for debt relief.
The planned changes to the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program will help roughly 550,000 borrowers of the 1.3 million enrolled in the program get closer to loan forgiveness, the Education Department said.
The department plans to announce the changes Wednesday, the latest move by the Biden administration to ease student-loan debt for select groups of borrowers.
Congress created the PSLF program in 2007 to encourage people to work in government or for some nonprofits.
To qualify for loan forgiveness, a borrower must work in a public-sector job and have made 120 on-time payments toward repaying the debt. But the program is only available to borrowers who have a specific type of student loan, known as Direct Loans, from the federal government. The requirement has caused confusion among borrowers unsure whether their loans qualify for loan forgiveness.
The department has previously allowed borrowers to consolidate their debt into Direct Loans but didn’t count repayments made before the consolidation.
The changes set to be announced Wednesday will temporarily allow all payments regardless of loan type to count toward the PSLF program, if borrowers consolidate their student debt by Oct. 31, 2022. Borrowers with formerly ineligible loans will also have their payments counted, if they apply for the program by that date, the Education Department said.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Leaders of historically black colleges and universities say President Joe Biden's budget package falls far short of how much the historically underfunded institutions need. The aid, currently penciled in for $1.45 billion to be distributed over a period of four years beginning in 2022, is much less than supporters anticipated, putting HBCUs at a disadvantage and risking Biden's support from a key constituency. And the final number for HBCUs could be even lower: The president's original $3.5 trillion Build Back Better plan is under intense negotiations in Congress, where key moderates want a more modest plan closer to $2 trillion. The presidents of the United Negro College Fund's 37 member institutions sent a letter to congressional leaders last week to urge Congress to pass the bill with more provisions for HBCUs. All of these concerns come ahead of a Wednesday hearing by a House subcommittee on higher education.” Read more at USA Today
“Tesla was ordered to pay more than $130 million in damages to a Black former worker. The company subjected the worker to a racially hostile work environment and failed to take reasonable steps to prevent him from being racially harassed, a federal jury found.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Covid-19 hospitalizations have decreased slightly across the US over the last week. The question is, is this the beginning of the end or just a temporary blip? Only 56% of Americans are fully vaccinated -- far below the threshold experts say is needed for herd immunity. Plus, children under 12 still aren’t eligible for vaccination, which means there’s still a lot of risk in that population. Children under 18 make up 22% of the population, but now represent 27% of Covid-19 cases -- a sign that the pandemic is now disproportionately affecting them. According to the CDC, 645 children have died from Covid-19 in the US. As officials prepare to review vaccines for young children, they are also considering authorizing a booster dose for people who got the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine.” Read more at CNN
“Johnson & Johnson asked the FDA to authorize its booster dose. The company cited studies showing its Covid-19 vaccine booster improved protection among adults who previously received a single shot.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“AstraZeneca asked the F.D.A. to authorize an antibody treatment that had reduced the risk of symptomatic Covid by 77 percent in a trial.” Read more at New York Times
“Depression and anxiety fell in early 2021 but have been more common during the pandemic than before it, the C.D.C. reports.” Read more at New York Times
“For about a week after the fall equinox, much of the eastern two-thirds of the Lower 48 states enjoyed crisp, refreshing autumn weather. But now Mother Nature has changed course. Warm, humid conditions more typical of late summer have returned and show little sign of retreating.
Forecasts now call for above-average temperatures lasting at least 10 days, with high temperatures in some areas nearly 30 degrees above normal at times. The core of the anomalous warmth is predicted to focus in the north-central United States, but above normal temperatures are anticipated to prevail in most places east of the Rockies.
The weather pattern may trigger heavy rainfall and severe storms in the central United States and could eventually support new tropical storm activity near the Gulf of Mexico.
It’s not clear when this warm pattern will break down, and October is almost certain to end up warmer than normal over a large part of the nation.” Read more at Washington Post
“When the last US military cargo jet flew out of Afghanistan in August, marking the end of the United States’ longest war, it also signaled a largely overlooked accomplishment. For the first time in the nation’s history, a major conflict was ending without the US military leaving any troops behind: no one missing in action behind enemy lines, and no nameless, unidentified bones to be solemnly interred in the Tomb of the Unknowns.
It is a stunning change from previous wars that ended with thousands of troops forever lost, their families left to wonder what had happened to them.” Read more at Boston Globe
“The Biden administration ended a ban on federal funds for clinics that refer patients for abortions. The move reversed a Trump-era policy that called for clinics that received federal funding to physically separate their abortion services in a different building from all other services, and not to discuss abortions as an option with patients.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“Missouri executed Ernest Lee Johnson for three 1994 murders. His supporters, including Pope Francis, said his intellectual disabilities made the execution unconstitutional.” Read more at New York Times
“FBI Ordered to Deal With Anti-Maskers Who Threaten Teachers
Furious parents have gotten so out of control that Attorney General Merrick Garland has ordered federal law enforcement authorities to step in to deal with what he called a ‘disturbing spike in harassment, intimidation, and threats of violence’ against teachers and school board members. A Justice Department statement said Garland has directed the FBI and U.S. Attorneys’ Offices to urgently meet law enforcement leaders to discuss what they can do to fight back against threats from angry parents. Last week, the National School Boards Association appealed to President Joe Biden for federal help in dealing with the threats, which the group said are mainly coming from anti-maskers and parents who wrongly believe their kids are being taught critical race theory. Garland wrote: ‘Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values.’ [Daily Beast] Read it at Politico
“South Dakota has become one of the world's foremost tax havens — right up with the Cayman Islands, and ahead of old-fashioned Switzerland, Axios Capital author Felix Salmon writes.
That's a fascinating finding from the Pandora Papers leak of confidential financial information about the world's rich.
‘South Dakota offers the best privacy and asset protection laws in the country, and possibly in the world,’ Florida-based tax expert Harvey Bezozi told The Guardian as part of the blockbuster series.
Why it matters: Hundreds of billions of dollars are sequestered in South Dakota trusts — generating no taxes and remaining effectively off limits to anyone who might have a legitimate claim on them.
Why South Dakota does this: It generates financial-services jobs, and boosts the state's business bona fides.
How it works: South Dakota has no income tax, no inheritance tax and no capital gains tax. But the state has gone even further: South Dakota allows for extreme secrecy when law enforcement comes knocking, and protects assets from being claimed by creditors, ex-spouses, or pretty much anybody else.
By setting up a trust, the ‘settlor’ — some billionaire — gives assets to a trustee in South Dakota. The trustee invests the assets for a ‘beneficiary,’ often a relative of the settlor. Neither the settlor nor beneficiary needs to set foot in the Mount Rushmore State.
All three parties — the settlor, the trustee and the beneficiary — can legally claim that the money isn't theirs.
How it happened: South Dakota started carving out its position as the most laissez-faire state for financial services in 1981, when it abolished upper limits for credit-card interest rates. (That's why the credit card in your wallet was likely issued in South Dakota.)
In 1983, South Dakota became the first state to allow perpetual trusts — money that can remain untouchable for centuries, with no one ever paying inheritance tax on it.
Since then, South Dakota has continued to pass laws making its trusts more attractive to the world's ultra-wealthy. Share this story.” Read more at Axios
“1,400 workers at all of Kellogg's cereal plants in the U.S. went on strike after a bargaining impasse. Get the latest.” Read more at Axios
“Trump Tumbles Off Forbes Rich List as COVID Slashes Fortune
Forbes magazine has released its annual list of America’s 400 wealthiest people and, for the first time since 1995, one name is notable only by its absence—Donald Trump. The ex-president has featured on every single Forbes 400 since 1996—usually in the top half—but the magazine reported that Trump’s estimated $2.5 billion fortune is $400 million short of this year’s cutoff to get on the list. Forbes wrote that Trump’s net worth has shrunk by $600 million since the start of the coronavirus pandemic because his portfolio is mainly made up of big-city properties that have sat relatively empty for the past year and a half. The magazine added that Trump had a golden opportunity to offload his assets at the start of his presidency and is now paying the price for not doing so. It stated: ‘If Trump is looking for someone to blame, he can start with himself.’” [Daily Beast] Read it at Forbes
“Facebook has apologized after it fell off the internet for well over six hours on Monday and the company has blamed the outage on what it ambiguously described as a ‘faulty configuration change.’ Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp are all back online after going dark on Monday in an outage that locked some 3.5 billion global users out of the services. In a blog posted late Monday, Facebook apologized for the massive outage, and added: ‘Our services are now back online and we’re actively working to fully return them to regular operations. We want to make clear at this time we believe the root cause of this outage was a faulty configuration change.’ It also said there was ‘no evidence that user data was compromised as a result of this downtime.’ The blog didn’t say who carried out the configuration change or whether it had been planned.” [Daily Beast] Read it at Reuters
The city of Yakutsk faces infrastructure challenges because of permafrost. THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
“Climate change is melting Russia’s permafrost.
Across the country, the thawing of earth thought to be forever frozen is threatening oil-and-gas infrastructure. Russian economic officials and scientists estimate that thawing permafrost could affect more than a fifth of Russian infrastructure. The economy stands to lose more than $68 billion by 2050, a government minister said in May. The government says that 40% of buildings and infrastructure facilities in permafrost-covered areas have already been damaged. The effects are particularly acute in Yakutia, the vast northeast Russia area of 1.2 million-square miles, five times the size of France. Yakutia’s capital of Yakutsk is the coldest constantly inhabited city in the world; temperatures fall to below minus 40 degrees Fahrenheit for at least three months each year. The region this summer made headlines for wildfires which further thawed the soil, scientists say. Houses in Yakutsk once could safely be built on piles sunk 26 feet into frozen ground, local construction engineer Eduard Romanov said. Nowadays, they must be dug in at almost 40 feet.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“It was Throwback Tuesday at ancient Fenway, featuring the Red Sox and Yankees jousting in a one game wild-card duel for the right to play in the 2021 American League Division Series. Winner moves on. Loser goes home. History, honor and hardball heartache were all in play. It was just like the old days of 2004, 2003, 1978 and 1949. The ghost of Babe Ruth hovered over Fenway….
It was very good for baseball and even better for the oft-maligned Red Sox, who thrashed the hated Yankees, 6-2, and advanced to a best-of-five American League Division Series against the 100-win Tampa Bay Rays starting Thursday in St. Petersburg, Fla. The Sox will be underdogs, which seems to be just the way these guys like it.” Read more at Boston Globe
“WASHINGTON (AP) — Some politicians think they’ve found a silver bullet for the impasse over the debt limit, except the bullet is made of platinum: Mint a $1 trillion coin, token of all tokens, and use it to flood the treasury with cash and drive Republicans crazy.
Even its serious proponents — who are not that many — call it a gimmick. They say it is an oddball way out of an oddball accounting problem that will have severe consequences to average people’s pocketbooks and the economy if it is not worked out in coming days.
But despite all the jokes about who should go on the face of the coin — Chuck E. Cheese? Donald Trump, to tempt or taunt the GOP? — there’s scholarship behind it, too. However improbable, it is conceivable the government could turn $1 trillion into a coin of the realm without lawmakers having a say.” Read more at AP News
“Singapore’s legislature approved a bill giving the government new powers over internet content. Proponents said the bill would target foreign influence campaigns by stopping foreigners and their local proxies from using social media and messaging apps to interfere in Singapore's affairs. Opponents said it could allow the government of the Southeast Asian nation, ruled since independence by a single party, to block the views of critics.” Read more at Wall Street Journal
“JERUSALEM (AP) — Israeli archaeologists have found a rare ancient toilet in Jerusalem dating back more than 2,700 years, when private bathrooms were a luxury in the holy city, authorities said Tuesday.
The Israeli Antiquities Authority said the smooth, carved limestone toilet was found in a rectangular cabin that was part of a sprawling mansion overlooking what is now the Old City. It was designed for comfortable sitting, with a deep septic tank dug underneath.” Read more at AP News
“K-pop superstars BTS have raised $3.6 million during four years of teaming up with the U.N. children's agency to fight violence, abuse and bullying and promote self-esteem in young people.” Read more at USA Today