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Instagram Boss Says 16 Hours of Daily Use Is Not Addiction

Instagram head Adam Mosseri told a Los Angeles courtroom last week that a teenager's 16-hour single-day session on the platform was "problematic use" but not an addiction, a distinction he drew repeatedly during testimony in a landmark trial over social media's harm to minors. Mosseri, who has led Instagram for eight years, is the first high-profile tech executive to take the stand. He agreed the platform should do everything in its power to protect young users but said how much use was too much was "a personal thing." The lead plaintiff, identified as K.G.M., reported bullying on Instagram more than 300 times; Mosseri said he had not known. An internal Meta survey of 269,000 users found 60% had experienced bullying in the previous week.

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India's New Social Media Rules: Remove Unlawful Content in Three Hours, Detect Illegal AI Content Automatically

Bloomberg reports: India tightened rules governing social media content and platforms, particularly targeting artificially generated and manipulated material, in a bid to crack down on the rapid spread of misinformation and deepfakes. The government on Tuesday (Feb 10) notified new rules under an existing law requiring social media firms to comply with takedown requests from Indian authorities within three hours and prominently label AI-generated content. The rules also require platforms to put in place measures to prevent users from posting unlawful material... Companies will need to invest in 24-hour monitoring centres as enforcement shifts toward platforms rather than users, said Nikhil Pahwa, founder of MediaNama, a publication tracking India's digital policy... The onus of identification, removal and enforcement falls on tech firms, which could lose immunity from legal action if they fail to act within the prescribed timeline. The new rules also require automated tools to detect and prevent illegal AI content, the BBC reports. And they add that India's new three-hour deadline is "a sharp tightening of the existing 36-hour deadline." [C]ritics worry the move is part of a broader tightening of oversight of online content and could lead to censorship in the world's largest democracy with more than a billion internet users... According to transparency reports, more than 28,000 URLs or web links were blocked in 2024 following government requests... Delhi-based technology analyst Prasanto K Roy described the new regime as "perhaps the most extreme takedown regime in any democracy". He said compliance would be "nearly impossible" without extensive automation and minimal human oversight, adding that the tight timeframe left little room for platforms to assess whether a request was legally appropriate. On AI labelling, Roy said the intention was positive but cautioned that reliable and tamper-proof labelling technologies were still developing. DW reports that India has also "joined the growing list of countries considering a social media ban for children under 16." "Young Indians are not happy and are already plotting workarounds."

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Social Networks Agree to Be Rated On Their Teen Safety Efforts

Meta, TikTok, Snap and other social neteworks agreed this week to be rated on their teen safety efforts, reports the Los Angeles Times, "amid rising concern about whether the world's largest social media platforms are doing enough to protect the mental health of young people." The Mental Health Coalition, a collective of organizations focused on destigmatizing mental health issues, said Tuesday that it is launching standards and a new rating system for online platforms. For the Safe Online Standards (S.O.S.) program, an independent panel of global experts will evaluate companies on parameters including safety rules, design, moderation and mental health resources. TikTok, Snap and Meta — the parent company of Facebook and Instagram — will be the first companies to be graded. Discord, YouTube, Pinterest, Roblox and Twitch have also agreed to participate, the coalition said in a news release. "These standards provide the public with a meaningful way to evaluate platform protections and hold companies accountable — and we look forward to more tech companies signing up for the assessments," Antigone Davis, vice president and global head of safety at Meta, said in a statement... The ratings will be color-coded, and companies that perform well on the tests will get a blue shield badge that signals they help reduce harmful content on the platform and their rules are clear. Those that fall short will receive a red rating, indicating they're not reliably blocking harmful content or lack proper rules. Ratings in other colors indicate whether the platforms have partial protection or whether their evaluations haven't been completed yet.

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The EU Moves To Kill Infinite Scrolling

Doom scrolling is doomed, if the EU gets its way. From a report: The European Commission is for the first time tackling the addictiveness of social media in a fight against TikTok that may set new design standards for the world's most popular apps. Brussels has told the company to change several key features, including disabling infinite scrolling, setting strict screen time breaks and changing its recommender systems. The demand follows the Commission's declaration that TikTok's design is addictive to users -- especially children. The fact that the Commission said TikTok should change the basic design of its service is "ground-breaking for the business model fueled by surveillance and advertising," said Katarzyna Szymielewicz, president of the Panoptykon Foundation, a Polish civil society group. That doesn't bode well for other platforms, particularly Meta's Facebook and Instagram. The two social media giants are also under investigation over the addictiveness of their design.

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Meta Plans To Let Smart Glasses Identify People Through AI-Powered Facial Recognition

Meta plans to add facial recognition technology to its Ray-Ban smart glasses as soon as this year, New York Times reported Friday, five years after the social giant shut down facial recognition on Facebook and promised to find "the right balance" for the controversial technology. The feature, internally called "Name Tag," would let wearers identify people and retrieve information about them through Meta's AI assistant, the report added. An internal memo from May acknowledged the feature carries "safety and privacy risks" and noted that political tumult in the United States would distract civil society groups that might otherwise criticize the launch. The company is exploring restrictions that would prevent the glasses from functioning as a universal facial recognition tool, potentially limiting identification to people connected on Meta platforms or those with public accounts.

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Russia Fully Blocks WhatsApp

An anonymous reader shares a report: U.S. messenger app WhatsApp, owned by Meta Platforms, has been completely blocked in Russia for failing to comply with local law, the Kremlin said on Thursday, suggesting Russians turn to a state-backed "national messenger" instead. "Due to Meta's unwillingness to comply with Russian law, such a decision was indeed taken and implemented," Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters, proposing that Russians switch to MAX, Russia's state-owned messenger.

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Laits infantiles : les autorités recensent un troisième décès de bébé ayant consommé un produit concerné par un rappel

À ce stade, aucun lien de cause à effet n’a été établi entre le décès du nourrisson et la consommation d’un produit rappelé.

© France, 25 January 2025 : Pharmacy section featuring baby products with diapers and lotions / Henry Saint John - stock.adobe.com

Nestlé, Lactalis, Danone... Tous les principaux fabricants de lait infantile ont engagé des campagnes de rappels.
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Le ministre du Travail Jean-Pierre Farandou exclut le recours «aux appels téléphoniques» pour traquer la fraude sociale

«Les plus gros fraudeurs ne sont pas les particuliers», a déclaré le ministre au micro de RMC, pointant du doigt un «petit nombre» d’entreprises qui ne s’acquittent par de leurs cotisations.

© Stephanie Lecocq / REUTERS

Le ministre du Travail, Jean-Pierre Farandou, a fustigé les «escrocs» qui «montent des entreprises bidon, déclarent trois salariés alors qu’il y en a en réalité 300 qui travaillent».
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Europe Accuses TikTok of 'Addictive Design' and Pushes for Change

TikTok's endless scroll of irresistible content, tailored for each person's tastes by a well-honed algorithm, has helped the service become one of the world's most popular apps. Now European Union regulators say those same features that made TikTok so successful are likely illegal. From a report: On Friday, the regulators released a preliminary decision that TikTok's infinite scroll, auto-play features and recommendation algorithm amount to an "addictive design" that violated European Union laws for online safety. The service poses potential harm to the "physical and mental well-being" of users, including minors and vulnerable adults, the European Commission, the 27-nation bloc's executive branch, said in a statement. The findings suggest TikTok must overhaul the core features that made it a global phenomenon, or risk major fines. European officials said it was the first time that a legal standard for social media addictiveness had been applied anywhere in the world. "TikTok needs to change the basic design of its service," the European Commission said in a statement.

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Près de 9 millions d’euros de préjudice : une vaste fraude aux cotisations sociales démantelée

Des sociétés de travail temporaires n’auraient pas déclaré leurs salariés, à leur insu. Les sociétés ayant eu recours à ces prestataires s’exposent à de «lourds redressements de l’Urssaf».

© Delphotostock / stock.adobe.com

Les salariés avaient l’illusion d’être déclarés. (Photo d’illustration)
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Dermatose : des parlementaires appellent à anticiper la «revaccination» pour éviter le retour de la maladie cet été

Ces parlementaires, mandatés pour faire un «premier bilan» de la crise de la dermatose bovine, soulignent une communication de l’État «parfois insuffisante ou inadaptée», qui a conduit à «une prolifération de fausses informations».

© Benoit Tessier / REUTERS

Après les protestations des agriculteurs contre la gestion de la dermatose, des parlementaires ont été mandatés pour établir un rapport sur cette crise sanitaire. 
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«CPE déguisé» proposé par le Medef : l'Unef agite la menace d'une mobilisation

Le syndicat étudiant «appelle l’ensemble de la jeunesse, étudiante et travailleuse, à se mobiliser contre ces attaques inacceptables», écrit-il dans un communiqué, en réaction à la proposition du Medef de créer un CDI «pouvant être rompu sans motif pendant les premières années».

© Halfpoint - stock.adobe.com

La mesure «vise à créer une génération de jeunes travailleurs précaires, corvéables à merci, sans droits ni protections», dénonce l’Unef.
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«Nouveau CPE déguisé», smic adapté... Les propositions choc du Medef pour l’emploi des jeunes provoquent une levée de boucliers

La première organisation patronale propose notamment de créer un CDI «pouvant être rompu sans motif pendant les premières années». Un dispositif qui rappelle le «contrat première embauche» (CPE), créé en 2006 par Dominique de Villepin, qui avait provoqué une mobilisation historique.

© THIBAUD MORITZ / AFP

L’organisation patronale, présidée par Patrick Martin, suggère également de regarder du côté du Smic, «qui peut parfois constituer un frein à l’emploi pour les primo-entrants». 
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Sébastien Lecornu enterre la réforme de l’assurance-chômage

DÉCRYPTAGE - Dans un courrier adressé aux partenaires sociaux, le premier ministre annonce retirer la lettre de cadrage envoyé par François Bayrou et fait une croix sur 4 milliards d’euros d’économies.

© Gonzalo Fuentes / REUTERS

Sébastien Lecornu a adressé une lettre aux partenaires sociaux dans laquelle il annonçait renoncer à une réforme de l’assurance-chômage.
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Assurance chômage : le gouvernement a accédé aux demandes des partenaires sociaux

Sébastien Lecornu a notamment «donné instruction d’engager les procédures d’agrément des dispositions de la convention du 15 novembre 2024 sur les primo-entrants» qui réduit de six à cinq la durée minimale d’affiliation, sur une durée de 24 mois, pour être indemnisé.

© herreneck / stock.adobe.com

Le Medef avait dit qu’il ne viendrait pas à la séance de négociations de mercredi, qui porte sur les contrats courts, sans réponse du gouvernement sur ce point. 
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