News

Facebook building a 'war room' to battle election meddling

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 20 06:16 AM

SAN FRANCISCO, United States - Facebook on Wednesday said it will have a "war room" up and running on its Silicon Valley campus to quickly repel efforts to use the social network to meddle in upcoming elections.   Read more »

Filipino nurse among 24 men nabbed in New Jersey sex sting

Don Tagala, ABS-CBN North America News Bureau
Posted at Sep 20 04:21 AM

NEW JERSEY - A Filipino nurse was among 24 men arrested in a sting operation in New Jersey, US law enforcement officials said Tuesday. Read more »

China mulls censoring online religious content

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 12 12:32 AM

Chinese authorities have drafted sweeping new regulations that would severely restrict religious content online, including images or even descriptions of religious activities from praying and chanting to burning incense. Read more »

'Deadly deadline': DICT confirms 3rd telco known by December

ABS-CBN News
Posted at Sep 11 09:23 PM

MANILA - The third major telecommunications company will be announced by December as President Rodrigo Duterte promised in his televised interview on Tuesday, the agency in charge of the process confirmed today.  Read more »

Duterte: Third telco known by December

ABS-CBN News
Updated as of Sep 11 06:54 PM

President Rodrigo Duterte said he will select the third major telco by late October or early November, as he also vowed to select the offer from the bidder with the "best track record."  Read more »

Trump war vs Silicon Valley worries many conservatives

Rob Lever, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 11 03:38 PM

The attacks from the White House coincide with a Justice Department announcement that it would convene talks on whether social media firms are "stifling" speech or harming competition, and precedes a series of hearings by regulators to review how antitrust laws apply to digital giants. Read more »

Canadian student emails 246 Nicoles hoping to find lost connection

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 11 07:48 AM

Boy meets girl, girl gives boy wrong number: some people might take it as a hint, but one Canadian student decided it was a challenge. Read more »

EU Parliament holds 'last chance' vote on copyright

Alex Pigman, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 10 09:21 PM

The European Parliament will vote Wednesday on a contentious copyright law that has pitted news companies and stars like Beatles legend Paul McCartney against Google and the creators of Wikipedia. Read more »

Jack Ma to unveil succession plans, not imminent retirement: SCMP

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 09 01:54 PM

Alibaba co-founder and chairman Jack Ma will unveil a succession plan on Monday, the South China Morning Post reported Sunday, with a company spokesman denying a New York Times report that he would retire that day.  Read more »

Facebook to build $1 billion Singapore data center, first in Asia

Agence France-Presse
Updated as of Sep 07 06:53 PM

Facebook said Thursday it will invest over $1 billion to build a data center in Singapore, its first in Asia, powered by renewable energy and adapted to the city-state's tropical climate.  Read more »

US to probe Big Tech on 'stifling' free speech

Rob Lever, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 06 08:59 AM

The Justice Department statement appeared to escalate a war between the administration and Silicon Valley after a series of attacks by Trump claiming tech firms were biased against conservatives.  Read more »

Google races to parry the rise of Facebook in India

Paresh Dave and Sankalp Phartiyal, Reuters
Posted at Sep 04 04:53 PM

Google officials in India earlier this year were alarmed to learn that Facebook Inc was likely to generate about $980 million in revenue in the country in 2018, according to one of the sources. Google's India revenues reached $1 billion only last year. Read more »

Brief Facebook outage reported by users

Agence France-Presse
Updated as of Sep 04 07:28 AM

Facebook users around the world on Monday reported the social network was briefly inaccessible, with many taking to Twitter to voice their frustration.   Read more »

Telcos urged to use average internet speed in ads

RG Cruz, ABS-CBN News
Posted at Sep 03 03:00 PM

On an average, carriers deliver an 'acceptable' 75 percent of the subscribed speed.  Read more »

Egypt president approves law clamping down on social media

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Sep 02 09:36 AM

Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi has ratified a law granting authorities the right to monitor social media users in the country as part of tightening internet controls, the official gazette said Saturday.  Read more »

Smart to kill MMS support as 5G looms

ABS-CBN News
Updated as of Aug 30 07:46 PM

After nearly 20 years, Smart, Talk 'N Text, and Sun Cellular will phase out its multimedia messaging service (MMS) starting September 28, as they prepare to offer 5G services. Read more »

Trump idea on regulating Google 'unfathomable,' analysts say

Rob Lever, Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 30 10:56 AM

Legal and media experts say Google and other internet firms enjoy the same constitutional protections on free speech as news outlets, precluding any government interference with the search results that displease the president. Read more »

Trump unblocks more critics on Twitter as ordered by court

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 30 07:34 AM

More critics of US Donald Trump found themselves unblocked from his Twitter account on Wednesday, in keeping with a court ruling that he can't shut out opposing viewpoints.  Read more »

Japanese leader calls for better cyber, space defense capabilities

Kyodo News
Posted at Aug 29 09:20 PM

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe on Wednesday called for strengthening Japan's defense capabilities in new fields such as cyberspace and outer space, citing the rapidly changing security situation surrounding the country. Read more »

Instagram adds verified accounts to 'stop bad actors'

Agence France-Presse
Posted at Aug 29 08:01 AM

Instagram on Tuesday set out to thwart duplicity with an option to authenticate high-profile accounts at the Facebook-owned image or video sharing social network. Read more »