SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Facebook Inc Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg on Wednesday said he supported Muslims in his community and around the world. Muslims in the United States and abroad have been criticized in the wake of attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, California. “As a Jew, my parents taught me that we must stand up against attacks on all communities
Read more(Reuters) – Twitter Inc confirmed on Tuesday it is testing a timeline format for its tweets, calling it an experiment. The microblogging website's new format will result in tweets being sorted by relevance instead of in reverse chronological order
Read moreBy Dustin Volz WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Fighting violent extremism online will be the focus of private briefings this week for members of the U.S. Congress from law enforcement officials and Silicon Valley executives, as Washington struggles to formulate a coherent strategy. The classified briefings, scheduled weeks ago, come as Washington policymakers grow increasingly alarmed at how the Islamic State militant group uses technology to recruit online and evade surveillance detection
Read moreBy Julia Love SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – Apple Inc on Tuesday released a version of its virtual personal assistant Siri for Arabic speakers in the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, potentially making its iPhones more attractive in a largely affluent market of more than 30 million people. The move, part of Apple's latest software updates, means people in those countries will be able to use Siri in their native tongue on iPhones, iPads and the Apple Watch.
Read moreBy Angela Moon and Melissa Fares NEW YORK (Reuters) – Republican presidential contender Donald Trump’s demand that the U.S. stop allowing Muslims into the United States lit up social media on Tuesday, as critics of the proposal around the world took to Twitter and Facebook to express their outrage. Outside of the United States, there were about 4.2 negative mentions for every positive one on social media regarding Trump, according to data provided by Zoomph, an analytics platform that tracks and aggregates social media mentions
Read moreAT&T Inc Chief Executive Randall Stephenson on Tuesday hinted at launching a mobile video streaming service as early as January to target price-conscious U.S. viewers who don't currently have pay-TV subscriptions. AT&T is interested in putting together a content bundle that can be viewed on a smaller screen, or to a single screen in a home that's not set-top box-driven, Stephenson said
Read moreBy Roberta Rampton and Dustin Volz WASHINGTON/NEW YORK (Reuters) – President Barack Obama on Sunday called on Silicon Valley to help address the threat of militant groups using social media and electronic communications to plan and promote violence, setting up renewed debate over personal privacy online. “I will urge high-tech and law enforcement leaders to make it harder for terrorists to use technology to escape from justice,” Obama said in a televised Oval Office speech
Read moreThe White House is urging Silicon Valley to help address the threat posed by militant groups by restricting the use of social media for planning and promoting violence, a senior administration official said on Sunday. In coming days, the White House will talk to companies in the tech sector about developing a “clearer understanding of when we believe social media is being used actively and operationally to promote terrorism,” said the official, speaking on background
Read moreThe San Bernardino shootings are reviving a debate about Washington's digital surveillance effort to find and capture violent extremists, with the recent shutdown of a U.S. cellphone spying program coming under renewed criticism. The debate is long-running and pits a huge and powerful national security apparatus against privacy and civil rights activists, who prevailed recently on the National Security Agency’s (NSA) bulk collection of cellphone metadata.
Read moreBy Jim Finkle and Jeremy Wagstaff BOSTON/SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Parents who gave their child a Kidizoom smartwatch or a VTech InnoTab tablet may have exposed them to identity theft after Hong Kong-based VTech said hackers stole the personal information of more than 6 million children. Shipments of toys that connect to the Internet will rise 200 percent over the next five years, according to estimates by UK-based Juniper Research. It's not clear what the motive was for the VTech breach nor whether it has resulted in any identity theft so far
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