The last time Congress passed a law to protect children on the internet was in 1998 — before Facebook, before the iPhone and long before today’s oldest teenagers were born. Now, a bill aiming to protect kids from the harms of social media, gaming sites and other online platforms has passed in the Senate with […]

The last time Congress passed a law to protect children on the internet was in 1998 — before Facebook, before the iPhone and long before today’s oldest teenagers were born. Now, a bill aiming to protect kids from the harms of social media, gaming sites and other online platforms appears to have enough bipartisan support […]

LONDON (AP) — The European Union said Friday that blue checkmarks from Elon Musk’s X are deceptive and that the online platform falls short on transparency and accountability requirements, the first charges against a tech company since the bloc’s new social media regulations took effect.  The European Commission outlined the preliminary findings from its investigation […]

LONDON (AP) — European Union regulators accused social media company Meta Platforms on Monday of breaching the bloc’s new digital competition rulebook by forcing Facebook and Instagram users to choose between seeing ads or paying to avoid them.  Meta began giving European users the option in November of paying for ad-free versions of Facebook and […]

The Federal Trade Commission has referred a complaint against TikTok and its parent company, ByteDance, to the Department of Justice.  The FTC said in a statement Tuesday that it investigated the two companies and “uncovered reason to believe” they are “violating or are about to violate” the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, a federal law […]

On the same day whistleblower Frances Haugen was testifying before Congress about the harms of Facebook and Instagram to children in the fall of 2021, a former engineering director at the social media giant who had rejoined the company as a consultant sent an alarming email to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg about the same topic. Arturo Bejar, […]

OTTAWA — The federal government is banning WeChat and Kaspersky applications from its phones over security concerns. WeChat is a social network, messaging and payments app from Chinese company Tencent, while Kaspersky was founded by Russian entrepreneur Eugene Kaspersky and offers cybersecurity and antivirus software. The government said both apps would be removed from its […]

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Authorities in Tennessee have settled a First Amendment lawsuit for $125,000, the plaintiff’s attorneys said Monday. The suit was filed by a man who said he was arrested over a disparaging social media post about a law enforcement officer killed in the line of duty. Joshua Andrew Garton was arrested in […]

In this issue: Big Wins, New Challenges: 2012 in Transparency A new year means new ways to support FIPA Privacy advocates raise red flags over C-12 surveillance measures New parliamentary study tackles big data, social media, and privacy Information Commissioner looks to overhaul Access to Information Act BC Commish tries to limit license plate surveillance […]

BC FIPA has sent its submission to the Committee on Access to Information, Privacy, and Ethics on the impacts of social media and ‘Big Data’ on privacy and the rights of citizens and the policy considerations that should be explored by the Committee in the context of amendments to the Personal Information Protection and Protection […]