Jun 30
Joe Scarborough Warns Mark Meadows ‘You’re In Deep S**t’ After New Jan. 6 Testimony
Posted in: Today's Chili“You may want to get yourself a really, really good criminal defense attorney,” the MSNBC host said of Trump’s former chief of staff.
Jun 30
Samsung has introduced a new ultra-rugged Galaxy smartphone that, unlike most competing models designed for harsh environments, isn’t entirely garish.
Jun 30
The House committee investigating the attack has presented damning evidence that Trump and his allies knowingly lied to try and overturn the 2020 election.
Jun 30
Facebook has been inconsistently enforcing its rule against buying or selling tobacco, marijuana, as well as medical and non-medical drugs in relation to abortion pills. Motherboard recently reported that the website has been flagging posts saying “abortion can be mailed” and has even been temporarily restricting some accounts. Engadget was able to independently verify the information. As social media companies start dealing with content related to the outcome of the Roe v. Wade ruling last week, Meta has admitted to the ‘incorrect enforcement’ of posts that may trigger rules relating to the buying and selling of pharmaceuticals on its platforms.
Gizmodo reports that Meta communications director Andy Stone has admitted that the website has “discovered some instances of incorrect enforcement” when it comes to its rule against the buying and selling pharmaceuticals. He also said that the company is correcting those instances.
Content that attempts to buy, sell, trade, gift, request or donate pharmaceuticals is not allowed. Content that discusses the affordability and accessibility of prescription medication is allowed. We’ve discovered some instances of incorrect enforcement and are correcting these.
— Andy Stone (@andymstone) June 27, 2022
In a tweet responding to Motherboard’s story, Stone said content attempting to buy, sell, trade, gift, request or donate pharmaceuticals aren’t allowed. However, content discussing the “affordability and accessibility of prescription medication” is. Posting “abortion pills can be mailed” shouldn’t be flagged if that’s the case, though it may run afoul of other rules related to promoting crime.
Gizmodo ran a test by posting “abortion pills can be mailed” on different accounts and found that Facebook was only flagging the status update if it was posted on a burner account, or an account that’s not regularly used. We were able to verify that, as well. The post we made on a barely used account was flagged, but the update we posted on our main account wasn’t.
We also tried posting about other pharmaceuticals and medicine on our accounts. Our post that said “I’m selling ivermectin, PM me” was flagged, but the one that said “ivermectin can be mailed” wasn’t. That’s consistent with the website’s rule. Our post saying “I’m selling cigarettes,” however, wasn’t flagged. We also tried posting “You can get abortion pills mailed from Aid Access,” which shouldn’t have been flagged if “affordability and accessibility of prescription medication” is allowed on the platform. We got restricted barely a minute after posting that on our burner account.
As you can see, enforcement of the rule has been inconsistent, and it’s not quite clear why the exact same content doesn’t get flagged on a frequently used account when it gets a warning on a barely used one. By flagging content about the mailing of abortion pills, Facebook could be preventing that information from getting to people who need it. Especially since it flags even the status updates of users outside the US.
The main Facebook website isn’t the only Meta property that’s been removing information about abortion pills. According to the Associated Press, Instagram has also been deleting posts about the mailing of abortion pills, though our search for #abortionpills yielded over 1,000 results.
Jun 30
Niantic, the company best known for “Pokemon GO,” has reportedly scrapped a handful of projects and laid off dozens of workers over economic concerns.
Jun 30
The subpoena came one day after former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson provided new details about Trump’s behavior on Jan. 6, 2021.
Jun 30
Mozilla’s latest Firefox browser release has a new feature that prevents sites like Facebook from tracking you across websites, Bleeping Computer has reported. Called Query Parameter Stripping, it automatically removes strings of characters added to the end of an URL that allow Facebook, Hubspot, Olytics and other companies to track your clicks and serve targeted ads.
You’ve likely noticed these queries when you click on a link that comes from Facebook, for example. Rather than showing “https://www.engadget.com/example.html,” it might show something like “https://www.engadget.com/example.html?fbclid=aa7-V4yb6Yfit_9_Pd” (not a real example).
That jumble of characters after the question mark is a query parameter that can tell a company you’ve clicked on a link, helping them profile you for ad targeting. If you enable the stripping feature in the latest version of Firefox, it’ll remove those characters before loading the URL, so Facebook will be none the wiser. It works via a blocklist and covers Olytics, Drip, Vero, HubSpot, Marketo and Facebook.
To enable the feature, you simply select “Strict” for “Enhanced Tracking Protection” in the Privacy & Security settings. That doesn’t work in Private Mode, but you can turn it on there too by typing “about:config” in the address bar, searching for strip and setting the ‘privacy.query_stripping.enabled.pbmode’ option to true, as Bleeping Computer points out.
Jun 30
While today’s Wordle solution isn’t the most common word, we have some solid hints that’ll push you in the right direction, plus the answer if you need it.
Jun 30
Disney Decides the Only Way to Top a $5,000 Star Wars Hotel Stay Is a $5,000 Star Wars Cocktail
Posted in: Today's Chili
Yes, you read that headline correctly: a $5,ooo drink. It comes served in a camtono, the bounty hunter accessory container most recently featured on The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett—which you can find it on Ebay for far less. So why is this drink, served only on the Disney Cruise Line’s newest ship, the Wish…
Jun 30
Jordyn Poulter, a member of the 2020 U.S. Women’s Volleyball Team, reported the medal stolen May 25 after her car was broken into at a parking garage in Anaheim.
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