Facebook attacked for emotion study

30 June 2014 Last updated at 03:31

Facebook is facing criticism after it emerged it had conducted a psychology experiment on nearly 700,000 users without their knowledge.

The test saw Facebook "manipulate" news feeds to control which emotional expressions the users were exposed to.

The research was done in collaboration with two US universities to gauge if "exposure to emotions led people to change their own posting behaviours".

Facebook said there was "no unnecessary collection of people's data".

"None of the data used was associated with a specific person's Facebook account," the social networking giant added.

Cornell University and the University of California at San Francisco were involved in the study.

Ability to manipulate?

Continue reading the main story

They are manipulating material from people's personal lives and I am worried about the ability of Facebook and others to manipulate people's thoughts in politics or other areas."

End Quote Jim Sheridan Labour MP

But some have criticised the way the research was conducted and raised concerns over the impact such studies could have.

"Let's call the Facebook experiment what it is: a symptom of a much wider failure to think about ethics, power and consent on platforms," Kate Crawford posted on Twitter.

Lauren Weinstein tweeted: "Facebook secretly experiments on users to try make them sad. What could go wrong?"

Meanwhile, Labour MP Jim Sheridan, a member of the Commons media select committee has called for an investigation into the matter.

"This is extraordinarily powerful stuff and if there is not already legislation on this, then there should be to protect people," he was quoted as saying by The Guardian newspaper.

"They are manipulating material from people's personal lives and I am worried about the ability of Facebook and others to manipulate people's thoughts in politics or other areas.

"If people are being thought-controlled in this kind of way there needs to be protection and they at least need to know about it."

However, Katherine Sledge Moore, a psychology professor at Elmhurst College, Illinois, said: "Based on what Facebook does with their newsfeed all of the time and based on what we've agreed to by joining Facebook, this study really isn't that out of the ordinary."

"The results are not even that alarming or exciting."

'Very sorry'

The research was conducted on 689,000 Facebook users over a period of one week in 2012.

According to the report on the study: "The experiment manipulated the extent to which people were exposed to emotional expressions in their News Feed".

The study found that users who had fewer negative stories in their news feed were less likely to write a negative post, and vice versa.

Adam Kramer of Facebook, who co-authored the report on the research, said: "We felt that it was important to investigate the common worry that seeing friends post positive content leads to people feeling negative or left out".

"At the same time, we were concerned that exposure to friends' negativity might lead people to avoid visiting Facebook."

However, he admitted that the firm did not "clearly state our motivations in the paper".

"I can understand why some people have concerns about it, and my co-authors and I are very sorry for the way the paper described the research and any anxiety it caused."

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Seized Silk Road bitcoin sold in US

30 June 2014 Last updated at 11:07

The auction of 29,000 bitcoins seized during a raid on the Silk Road internet marketplace has been completed.

The sale of the coins, worth about $18.7m (£11m), was carried out by the US Marshals Service on 27 June.

The Silk Road shut down in late 2013 following raids by the FBI and other law enforcement agencies which said it was trading in illegal drugs.

The auction ran for about 12 hours and the successful bidders are due to notified on 30 June.

The seized bitcoins are part of the civil forfeiture and criminal action brought against Silk Road owner Ross William Ulbricht.

The bitcoin hoard was sold by being split into nine blocks of 3,000 coins and one of 2,657.

The US Marshals declined to name who had put down bids for the coins although earlier this month the agency accidentally leaked a list of some of the buyers in an email update about the sale.

Officials at the Agency wrongly addressed the email message, inadvertently revealing most of the people to whom it had been sent.

The list included UK-based virtual currency payment processor Coinbase as well as auction site Second Market and marketplace Bitcoin Shop.

Another larger hoard of bitcoins, believed to be worth about $85m, was also seized during the 2013 raid. Mr Ulbricht is contesting ownership of these bitcoins saying they are his personal property and are not part of the Silk Road's assets now controlled by the US government.

The sale comes as California clarifies state laws governing crypto currencies such as Bitcoin. Until now it has been technically illegal to buy and sell using virtual currencies. The law ends a state prohibition that requires commerce to be transacted only with US currency.

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Amazon 'bullying' UK publishers

26 June 2014 Last updated at 23:26 By Joe Miller Technology reporter

Amazon is facing a battle with UK publishers as it seeks to secure more advantageous terms in its latest round of contract negotiations.

The web giant wants the right to print books itself if publishers fail to provide adequate stock, and wants publishers to match any pricing deals it offers to other distributers.

One mid-sized firm accused Amazon of "bullying," and warned that the company was destroying the industry.

Amazon has not commented on the issue.

Trade magazine the Bookseller was first to report that Amazon had introduced a number of new clauses in its recent contract proposals to independent UK publishers.

'Print-on-demand'

Among these were the right for Amazon to print its own copies of a book if a publisher runs out of stock.

The Seattle-based company would do this using its "print-on-demand" equipment, and would require publishers to hand over electronic versions of their titles.

The process, which can print books more quickly than a traditional press, is generally thought to offer an inferior product.

Publishers are concerned that if Amazon used this method to print books, customers would blame them, and not the tech firm, for the quality.

Another clause, known in the industry as a "most favoured nation" (MFN) proposal, asks publishers not to offer promotions to distributors without also offering them to Amazon.

This would include selling books at a discount on the publishers' own websites.

It also demands that publishers inform Amazon before offering e-book deals to other clients, and give the tech firm the same terms.

Unprecedented

The BBC spoke to independent UK publishing companies who were alarmed at the proposals.

One representative of a mid-sized firm said Amazon had become "increasingly ruthless" in its negotiations, while another accused Amazon of "bullying".

One boss added that they believed the MFN clause would cause Amazon to fall foul of competition rules, and should be of concern to regulators.

Publishers also told the BBC that Amazon generally prefers verbal agreements, and rarely documents its negotiations, but had done so in the latest round of talks, with one "mid-tier" firm saying this was the first time it had received correspondence outlining such terms.

One independent publisher, which releases between 80 and 100 titles each year, said it had been approached by Amazon in the past with the above clauses.

'Ryanair moment'

A senior manager told the BBC that if asked to agree to the terms, the firm's answer would be a "simple and monosyllabic no".

They also warned that Amazon was reaching a "Ryanair moment", when customers and suppliers would become uncomfortable with the way that the company operates.

The BBC also approached several of the larger publishers, including Hachette, Penguin Random House and Harper Collins, all of whom refused to provide comment.

The Bookseller's editor, Philip Jones, told the BBC that if Amazon's terms were agreed, it would be a "form of assisted suicide for the industry".

But he added that the negotiations might be a "tactic" by Amazon, and could be dropped before a final deal is struck.

The BBC understands that similar terms were proposed in the past - although without the current forcefulness - but later abandoned by Amazon.

The negotiation process generally takes many months.

Competition investigations

The tech firm is currently involved in a high profile spat with publishers Hachette in the US. The two companies are locked in discussions about how to share profits on e-books - a dispute which has led to price increases and a block on pre-orders of Hachette books.

In a separate development, a German trade association has brought a complaint against Amazon to the country's competition authorities, claiming the firm abused its market dominance.

On Thursday, the Associated Press reported that the French government, in a bid to support the country's small bookshops, has adopted a bill that will prevent Amazon and other online retailers from offering free deliveries of discounted books.

The EU commission confirmed to the BBC that it was monitoring the UK book industry. The EU has investigated MFN clauses in the past, but has never ruled them illegal.

But Mr Jones also emphasised the positive role Amazon has played in the bookselling industry.

"The worst thing that could happen [to book publishers] would be for Amazon to go away," he said.

"The second worst thing would be for it to become more dominant."

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Electric car running costs 'rising'

27 June 2014 Last updated at 12:25 By Samantha Fenwick Radio 4 You and Yours Reporter

It could now cost more to run an electric car than one using fuel owing to the end of UK government subsidies.

The Department for Transport's support for the installation and maintenance of chargers ended in April.

Local councils, left to cover costs, tendered contracts out to private companies - and prices have gone up.

Transport Minister Baroness Kramer told You and Yours £500m was being invested over five years to provide support for electric vehicle drivers.

In the first five months of this year, nearly 2,000 electric cars were sold in the UK - more than double the sales for the same period in 2013.

Continue reading the main story

• Charge points began to appear around the UK in about 2010
• Machines were installed by local authorities at a cost of about £50,000
• The rapid chargers can power up an electric vehicle in 30 minutes

One of the reasons for the increase is the perception that the running costs of an electric vehicle will be cheaper than a fossil fuel car.

There are concerns that increasing the cost of charging will choke market growth just as it begins to take off.

While electric cars are around £8,000 more expensive than a diesel or petrol one, the government offers a £5,000 grant towards the cost of the car, and will help to install a charge system at home.

Until very recently it was free to charge your car at all public power points. Now Charge Master, one of the biggest providers, asks for £7.50 for a half-hour rapid charge.

Andrew Fenwick-Green, marketing secretary of the Electric Vehicle Drivers Association, drives a Nissan Leaf. He said: "A gallon of diesel for most eco-diesels will cost you £6.30 and get you around 60 miles.

"A 30-minute rapid charge in my Nissan Leaf would give you a range of 64 miles. So we're paying an extra £1.20 more to get the same mileage. It's madness... if the rapid chargers go up to £7.50 we're going to kill the market at a stroke".

Support

The Charge Your Car company asks for £5 for a rapid charge, and Transport for London awarded its contract to the French company Bollore, which will introduce an annual fee of £10 for unlimited charging from September.

Charge Master chief executive David Martell has asked for more support.

"Next year the amount of annual expenditure from Government on infrastructure is going to be slashed by two-thirds, which I think is a little too early.

"We need a few years' more support from the Government to allow proper businesses models to arrive for charging."

Lady Kramer said: "The whole point of this is that you charge at home. That leaves you with a cost of about 2p per mile, which is why it's attractive to the people who have been buying these cars.

"The public rapid chargers are intended for occasional use."

She added that the industry could have communicated with customers better but the shift to charging would not stymie the emerging electric vehicle market.

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E-voting experiments end in Norway

27 June 2014 Last updated at 12:12

Norway is ending trials of e-voting systems used in national and local elections.

Experiments with voting via the net were carried out during elections held in 2011 and 2013.

But the trials have ended because, said the government, voters' fears about their votes becoming public could undermine democratic processes.

Political controversy and the fact that the trials did not boost turnout also led to the experiment ending.

In a statement, Norway's Office of Modernisation said it was ending the experiments following discussions in the nation's parliament about efforts to update voting systems.

The statement said although there was "broad political desire" to let people vote via the net, the poor results from the last two experiments had convinced the government to stop spending money on more trials.

The 2013 trial was also controversial because immediately prior to the election, criticism was levelled at the encryption scheme used to protect votes being sent across the net. Software experts called for the entire voting system to be rewritten to better protect data.

A report looking into the success of the 2013 trial said about 70,000 Norwegians took the chance to cast an e-vote. This represented about 38% of all the 250,000 people across 12 towns and cities who were eligible to vote online.

However, it said, there was no evidence that the trial led to a rise in the overall number of people voting nor that it mobilised new groups, such as young people, to vote.

The report by Norway's Institute of Social Research also expressed worries about the fact that online voting took place in what it called "uncontrolled environments". This, it said, undermined the need for a vote to be made in secret without anyone influencing the voter as they made their choice.

It said there was also some evidence that a small number of people, 0.75% of all voters, managed to vote twice in 2013. They did this by voting once online then travelling to a polling station to cast a paper ballot.

Norway has made its decision soon after Jenny Watson, head of Britain's Electoral Commission, said the UK should move more swiftly to adopt e-voting as it could help arrest a decline in the numbers of young voters.

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Bad review couple win compensation

26 June 2014 Last updated at 15:04

Online retailer KlearGear has been ordered to pay $306,750 (£180,000) to a couple it has had a long-running dispute with over a bad review.

Jennifer Palmer posted a review on RipOffReport.com criticising KlearGear customer service, after her husband ordered two items that never arrived.

KlearGear later asked her to remove the post and threatened a $3,500 fine.

The case was resolved in a default judgement after KlearGear failed to respond to the legal action.

The couple's lawyers told technology news site Ars Technica that collecting the money could prove problematic.

"Now we're going to be figuring out where KlearGear's assets are and how we can collect them," they said.

Customer service

The row stretches back to December 2008 when John Palmer ordered two items, worth less than $20, as a gift for his wife.

The items did not arrive and after repeated calls to the company the couple were told that the items had never been paid for and had been cancelled.

In response Mrs Palmer posted a review claiming "there is absolutely no way to get in touch with a physical human being" and describing KlearGear's "horrible customer service practices".

Three years later, Mr Palmer received an email demanding that the review be deleted within 72 hours or a fine of $3,500 would be levied as he was in violation of the firm's "non-disparagement clause".

Although the Palmers never sent the money, KlearGear attempted to get it via a debt collection service, which the couple allege damaged their credit rating.

Commonsense victory?

Ars Technica, which has been following the case in detail, said that Descoteaux Boutiques, KlearGear's Paris-based parent firm had contacted it.

Emails from Vic Mathieu director of corporate communications claimed that Mr Palmer had been "belligerent towards our customer care staff and threatened to defame KlearGear if he did not receive free merchandise".

Partner at law firm Harbottle and Lewis, Andy Millmore said that it was a partial victory for common sense.

"I should be able to say something fair and reasonable about a firm I have bought goods from," he said.

"It shouldn't have taken three or four years at massive legal cost to reach that conclusion."

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Facebook fights US court over data

27 June 2014 Last updated at 12:37 By Joe Miller Technology reporter

Facebook is fighting a US court order in which it was forced to hand over data belonging to almost 400 people involved in a benefit fraud trial.

The social media site said the request was "by far the largest" it had ever received from a government body.

Photographs, private messages and other information were supplied to a New York court last year, but the process was only made public by a judge this week.

The ruling defined Facebook as a "digital landlord".

A judge said this definition meant the company must comply with search warrants.

The original case investigated fraudulent claimants of US federal disability benefits, whose Facebook accounts apparently showed that they were in fact healthy.

The web giant was ordered to hand over information from the 381 accounts, which the court said contained "evidence of criminality".

'Unconstitutional'

After an appeal was denied, Facebook complied with the request but protested that it violated the Fourth Amendment of the US constitution, which protects against "unreasonable searches and seizures".

Facebook also voiced concerns about the lack of date restrictions on the warrant, which it argued allowed the US government to keep the data indefinitely, and the range of data requested, which it said would contain private material which bore no relation to the trial.

The proceedings have been kept private by the court, but after a fresh appeal by Facebook a New York judge has now made the court filing public.

Facebook said the government had obtained "gag orders", preventing it from telling the account holders that it had been forced to hand over their data.

"This unprecedented request is by far the largest we've ever received - by a magnitude of more than ten - and we have argued that it was unconstitutional from the start," wrote Chris Sonderby, a legal adviser to Facebook.

"Of the 381 people whose accounts were the subject of these warrants, 62 were later charged in a disability fraud case.

"This means that no charges will be brought against more than 300 people whose data was sought by the government without prior notice to the people affected."

'Virtual custodian'

But a spokesperson for the Manhattan district attorney defended the court's actions.

"This was a massive scheme involving as many as 1,000 people who defrauded the federal government," said Joan Vollero.

"The defendants in this case repeatedly lied to the government about their mental, physical, and social capabilities. Their Facebook accounts told a different story."

In a summation of the legal justification for the court's decision, the judge wrote: "Facebook could best be described as a digital landlord, a virtual custodian or storage facility for millions of tenant users and their information.

"Hence, the search warrants authorise the search and seizure of digital information contained within the Facebook server."

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Anger at secret e-borders legal bill

27 June 2014 Last updated at 16:12 By Brian Wheeler Political reporter

Ministers are facing calls to reveal the cost of a four-year legal battle with the US defence giant they sacked from the aborted e-borders project.

Raytheon was hired by the previous Labour government to set up an electronic system for counting all travellers in and out of the UK.

It was fired by the coalition in 2010 over alleged poor performance and is suing the government for £500m.

MPs are demanding to know why the case has not been settled.

Instead of fighting it in open court, both parties agreed to go to arbitration, meaning hearings were held behind closed doors in a private court.

The outcome has yet to be revealed by the arbitration panel, even though hearings are thought to have ended a year ago.

The Home Office said in June last year it expected a verdict "soon". Raytheon said in April this year it would probably come in the first half of 2014.

'Matter of urgency'

The cost to British taxpayers is likely to run into hundreds of millions of pounds but MPs fear the full details of the dispute will never be revealed.

Conservative MP Mark Reckless, speaking in a Westminster Hall debate on migration statistics on Thursday, asked whether arbitration in private was "really appropriate in terms of public contracts, let alone ones for £750m".

Keith Vaz, chairman of the home affairs select committee, said: "This is about the public knowing. It's public money that's gone into this. We also need to know why it has taken four years.

"We need to know what went wrong so we don't do it again. For all we know, if we don't know what went wrong, this could be happening again and again and it is vital that we get to the problem of e-borders."

E-borders was meant to collate and store on a single database information about all passengers who enter and leave the UK to improve security and identify suspected terrorists and criminals.

The coalition terminated the contract with Raytheon in May 2010 saying it had no confidence in the supplier to address problems with the system.

Raytheon said the government's targets and objectives changed repeatedly through the course of the programme, which covered both Labour and coalition administrations.

At the time, the Home Office said Raytheon would be replaced by a new e-borders supplier "as a matter of urgency".

Exit checks

But in March this year, ministers formally killed off the e-borders name, moving its functions into the Borders System Programme.

This relies on the Home Office Warnings Index, first introduced in 1995, and Semaphore, a pilot system developed by IBM in 2004 that was meant to have been replaced by the Raytheon-led Trusted Borders consortium.

Immigration Minister James Brokenshire told MPs that the aim of counting all passengers in and out of the UK to provide more accurate immigration statistics - one of the original objectives of the e-borders system - had been dropped.

But he said the Office for National Statistics was experimenting with using data from Semaphore to improve the accuracy of its migration figures.

The figures are currently based on a random survey of travellers, a process that has been heavily criticised by the Public Administration Committee for its wide margin of error.

He said the Home Office was still on track to introduce exit checks at international rail, sea and air terminals by April 2015.

'Huge mistake'

And the electronic monitoring system it has been using since 2010 was fulfilling the original mission of e-borders "to target and monitor those seeking to travel to and from the UK who may harm this country's interests".

"It is an extremely valuable tool and, indeed, since 2010 our borders systems have issued alerts resulting in 13,300 arrests, including 60 for murder, 59 for kidnap and 167 for rape," he told MPs.

Keith Vaz said the Labour government he had been a part of had made a "huge mistake" by signing a £750m deal with Raytheon in the first place and the coalition had been right to cancel it.

He said the US multinational, which manufactures missile defence systems and made the computer guidance system for the Apollo 11 moon shot, had been hired because it had delivered similar border security systems in other parts of the world.

But he said the ministers in charge - which did not include himself - had mishandled the contract.

"When they signed the agreement with Raytheon, they did not put benchmarks in that agreement, as a result of that Raytheon was able to turn round and say 'well, we were not told what to do.'

"This is the subject of an arbitration that has been going on, I think, for four years. It could well be the longest arbitration in history. And every time we ask for information, nobody wants to tell the select committee what is going on."

Labour's shadow immigration minister David Hanson backed calls for the full details of the case to be published so it could be held up to public scrutiny.

Mr Brokenshire neglected to address the Raytheon issue in the Westminster Hall debate - but was urged to "take notice" of MPs' concerns by Bernard Jenkin, the Conservative chairman of the Public Administration Committee.

Raytheon executives were quizzed about the e-borders legal battle in April, in a conference call with financial journalists.

Senior vice president and chief financial officer Dave Wajsgras said: "We expect the decision from the panel sometime in the first half of 2014. That's our expectations. But it's behind closed doors and we'll see, you know, when we get a decision. That's all we have."

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BT apologises for broadband problem

28 June 2014 Last updated at 13:19

BT has apologised after "many" users in the UK experienced problems recently connecting to the internet, but says the issue has now been resolved.

Users complained they were unable to connect to some websites - including social media, banking and shopping sites - as a result of the problems.

BT said it was unable to say how many customers had been hit, but issues were reported in various parts of the UK.

"We're sorry for any trouble this may have caused," a BT spokesman said.

The firm, which has about seven million broadband subscribers in the UK, said it was still investigating the incident.

A message posted on Twitter by BTCare said: "Sorry about the issues many of you had accessing the Internet this morning. Problem is now fixed- sorry for any trouble caused."

'Wildfire'

Customers complained of problems in parts of Cornwall, as well as in Eastbourne, Preston, Tunbridge Wells and several other areas.

David Black, from St Austell, told the BBC: "It started with eBay at 09:30 BST and is spreading like wildfire.

"Amazon, Netflix, most forums, Facebook and Twitter are all blocked, with more being blocked all the time."

He added: "No-one can get through to the BT help pages as, ironically, they are also affected."

Another BT customer, Peter Clayton, added: "It seems to be all the major sites that don't work. HSBC, eBay, Amazon.

"My plumbing website seems also to be down and I'm a small business so this really does affect me as I have people in my office just twiddling their thumbs."

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Toys classed as drones by US agency

30 June 2014 Last updated at 13:55

Hobbyists are concerned new US Federal Aviation Administration guidance classifying first-person-view model aircraft as drones will ground toy planes unless they have a permit.

The FAA hopes its list of "dos and don'ts" will make model aircraft safer.

But David Schneider, of the IEEE Spectrum, said a child's toy such as the Hubsan FPV X4 Mini RTF Quadcopter would now require a permit to fly.

Models must be visible at all times, without vision-enhancing devices.

These include:

• binoculars
• night-vision goggles
• powered vision-magnifying devices
• goggles that give a "first-person view" from the model

"Such devices would limit the operator's field of view thereby reducing his or her ability to see and avoid other aircraft in the area," the guidance says.

"Additionally, some of these devices could dramatically increase the distance at which an operator could see the aircraft, rendering the statutory visual-line-of-sight requirements meaningless."

The guidance also states model aircraft can be flown only for recreational - not commercial - purposes. Operators can take pictures of their house, for example, but cannot use them to advertise the house for sale

Model aircraft must also weigh 55lb or less. And when flying within five miles of an airport, the operator must warn the air traffic control tower.

British Model Flying Association development officer Manny Williamson told the BBC: "The BMFA is monitoring the developing situation in the United States regarding the FAA's stance on the operation of first-person-view model aircraft with considerable interest.

"First-person-view flight is permitted in the UK under the terms of an exemption from certain provisions of the Air Navigation Order issued annually by the CAA [Civil Aviation Authority].

"The current exemption was issued in May 2014, and there are no indications that the current permissions will be revoked or altered in any way.

"In the UK, first-person-view flight is a recognised and valid aspect of recreational model flying and the BMFA is keen to maintain and support this position for the benefit of all UK model flyers."

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