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☆ The Twitter leaders Elon Musk put in place keep quitting or getting fired. See who's left and who's recently been hired, including engineers from Google's DeepMind and a Tesla superfan.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-03 | by ( Kali Hays | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

About half of the 20 people who reported to Elon Musk after his takeover have left Twitter. Musk has hired some new people, including engineers who may be working on an AI project. Elon Musk's Twitter is ruled by chaos. None have been directly replaced, the people familiar said, although Musk has also hired some new people from outside his companies. Below is a complete list of who Musk set as his direct reports, including those who have already left the company.

☆ TikTok to set one-hour daily screen time limit by default for users under 18
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( Catherine Thorbecke | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

CNN —TikTok announced Wednesday that every user under 18 will soon have their accounts default to a one-hour daily screen time limit, in one of the most aggressive moves yet by a social media company to prevent teens from endlessly scrolling. Teenage TikTok users will be able to turn off this new default setting, which will roll out in the coming weeks. The move comes after TikTok and other social media platforms have faced years of scrutiny over their impact on young users, including their potential to lead teens down harmful rabbit holes. TikTokKeenan added that if a teen decides to turn off this new default limit and spends more than 100 minutes on TikTok a day, they will be prompted to set a daily screen time limit for themselves. Parents will be able to filter videos with words or hashtags they don’t want to appear in their teen’s feed, set a custom daily screen time limit for their teen, and set a custom schedule to mute TikTok notifications sent to their teen.

☆ TikTok sets automatic one-hour screen time limit for teens
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( Rohan Goswami | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

TikTok said Wednesday it will implement an automatic 60-minute screen-time limit for all users under the age of 18. Teens will be able to opt out of the feature if they want, but TikTok said that the app will prompt teens to set a limit if they spend "more than 100 minutes on TikTok in a day." TikTok is taking steps to curb screen time for its younger users as it stares down growing scrutiny from regulators and lawmakers over its security and the safety of children on the platform. A study from the Pew Research Center last August found 67% of American teenagers used TikTok, with 16% of all teens saying they used it "constantly." TikTok parent ByteDance faces a probe from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, also known as CFIUS, over national security concerns.

☆ Fledgling social media sites are competing to be the next Twitter as users abandon the legacy platform. These are the frontrunners.
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( Katherine Tangalakis-Lippert | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Gabor Cselle, co-founder & CEO is a former Group Product Manager at Twitter. Funding: T2 has raised $1.1 million from angel investors, Cselle told Insider. "I was like, 'maybe now's the time,'" Cselle told Insider, who reached out and partnered with Oh on their new build. "Usually the safety has come after something bad happens," Oh told Insider. The T2 website name will change so as not to evoke Terminator associations, Cselle told Insider.

☆ TikTok is automatically setting a one-hour limit for users under 18 — but it's a setting that's easy to bypass
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-01 | by ( Jordan Hart | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

TikTok announced a new one-hour screen time limit for teens, among other controls. A bill that would ban TikTok in the US was advanced by the US House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday. TikTok also announced updates to its Family Pairing feature that will allow a parent or guardian to link their account to their teen's TikTok and set parental controls. The US House Foreign Affairs Committee voted on Wednesday to advance a bill that would give President Joe Biden the power to ban TikTok, according to a report from CNBC. Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher of Wisconsin, sponsor of the act to ban TikTok, dubbed the app "digital fentanyl," Insider's Brian Metzger reported last week.

☆ Australia tells Twitter, Google to give information on handling online child abuse
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-22 | by ( Byron Kaye | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

REUTERS/Dado Ruvic/IllustrationSYDNEY, Feb 23 (Reuters) - An Australian regulator has sent legal letters to Twitter and Google telling them to hand over information about their efforts to stop online child abuse, drawing them into a crackdown that has already put pressure on other global tech firms. She said it was in Twitter's interests to show that it was acting effectively to eradicate child sexual abuse material, otherwise advertisers could turn away from the company. Apart from writing to Twitter, the commissioner also sent letters to Alphabet Inc's (GOOGL.O) Google, owner of YouTube and the file storage unit Google Drive, and China's TikTok. Last year, the commissioner sent similar notices to Apple Inc (AAPL.O), Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) and Facebook owner Meta Platforms (META.O). read moreInman Grant said a 2020 joint investigation with the Canadian Centre for Child Protection found widespread publicly-available abuse material on Twitter, which those authorities reported to Twitter's head of trust and safety.

☆ Twitter's team focused on ethics rushed to publish research papers before Elon Musk's takeover fearing he would lay them off, report says
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-16 | by ( Pete Syme | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Twitter's AI ethics team hurriedly published studies in the weeks before Elon Musk's takeover, Wired reported. The team feared "the runway would shut down when the Elon jumbo jet landed," one ex-staffer told Wired. In Musk's first week owning Twitter, he laid-off most of the team, known internally as META. "We were rightfully worried about what this leadership change would entail," Rumman Chowdhury, who was engineering director on the team, told Wired. Employees told Wired that several more papers on misinformation and algorithms were quickly published too around the time of the takeover.

☆ Here's what we know about Hamilton 68, the Russian online influence tracker called into question by the 'Twitter Files'
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-10 | by ( Sonam Sheth | Michelle Mark | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +10 min

A recent "Twitter Files" drop revealed deep concerns among Twitter executives about a database that claimed to track Russian propaganda in "near real time." The now defunct database, Hamilton 68, was widely cited by media outlets, including Insider, before it was shut down in 2018. He wrote that based on his analysis, Hamilton 68 "falsely accuses a bunch of legitimate, right-leaning accounts of being Russian bots." Berger and ASD did not respond to a request to provide Insider with the list of accounts Hamilton 68 tracked. Roth also claimed, after reverse-engineering the list of accounts that Hamilton 68 tracked, that they were "neither strongly Russian nor strongly bots."

Under Musk’s leadership, Twitter has slashed its staff, relaxed some of its content moderation policies and reinstated a number of incendiary accounts that were previously banned. Those moves raised concerns that Musk’s Twitter could contribute to a rise in public displays of hate and antisemitism offline. Musk, however, has repeatedly pushed back at claims that hate speech is rising on the platform. Twitter, which eliminated much of its public relations team during last year’s layoffs, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. “With this direct and heightened threat environment in mind, how will you work with other stakeholders to combat the rise of antisemitism on Twitter?,” Moskowitz concludes in his letter to Musk.

☆ An ex-Twitter exec told Congress he had to sell his home after a barrage of 'homophobic and antisemitic' harassment over the 'Twitter Files'
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-09 | by ( Sawdah Bhaimiya | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A former Twitter exec said "homophobic and antisemitic" harassment forced him to sell his home. Yoel Roth testified to Congress that the release of Elon Musk's "Twitter Files" harmed former staff. During a lengthy hearing related to Twitter's handling with the Hunter Biden laptop story, Roth was asked how the release of Elon Musk's Twitter Files had affected his personal safety. He began by saying that the "Twitter Files" also affected more junior employees at Twitter, and that staff as far away as the Philippines were "doxxed, had their families threatened, and experienced harm equal to or greater than what I've experienced." The "Twitter Files" are a series of tweets released under Musk's leadership about "free speech suppression" on the platform under its previous management.

☆ Former Twitter execs tell Republicans they erred on Hunter Biden laptop story
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( David Morgan | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +4 min

WASHINGTON, Feb 8 (Reuters) - Former Twitter executives told a Republican-led U.S. House committee on Wednesday that they made a mistake by blocking tweets about a laptop said to belong to President Joe Biden's son Hunter but said government officials were not involved. The committee's witnesses, three former Twitter executives, said in subpoenaed testimony that they mistakenly believed the Post article contained hacked material and reversed their decision to limit its circulation on the social media platform within 24 hours. "America witnessed a coordinated campaign by social media companies, mainstream news and the intelligence community to suppress and de-legitimize the existence of Hunter Biden's laptop and its contents," committee Chairman James Comer said at the outset of the proceedings. Hunter Biden's attorney Abbe Lowell has denied in a statement any connection between his client and what he called the "so-called laptop," including contents that Republicans "allege to be Mr. Biden's personal data." The Twitter executives also said company policy sought to mitigate content that could lead to political violence, such as what later occurred in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by Trump's supporters.

☆ Watch: Former Twitter executives testify before the House Oversight Committee
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Lauren Feiner | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Three former Twitter executives are set to testify before the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday beginning at 10 a.m. Still, Twitter's new owner Elon Musk, who clashed with the former executives testifying, has promised to restore free speech to the platform. Wednesday's hearing features Twitter's former chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde, former deputy general counsel James Baker, former Twitter policy official Annika Collier Navaroli and former global head of trust and safety Yoel Roth. Twitter took the extreme step of blocking links to the story, citing its hacked materials policy. Twitter's then-CEO said the company's approach was wrong and changed the policy, but many lawmakers' trust was already broken.

☆ Republicans held a hearing to prove Twitter’s bias against them. It backfired in spectacular fashion
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Oliver Darcy | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

Despite no real evidence to support this weighty and consequential claim, Republicans were unrelenting in peddling it to the American public. Republicans showed, once again, that they are married to pushing claims that Silicon Valley is intentionally and unjustly censoring conservative views, even when the facts do not contort with their narrative. Ironically, the hearing appeared to reveal that Twitter had acquiesced to Trump and changed its policies after it concluded that he had violated its rules. And the hearing hinted that the Trump White House attempted to censor the speech of at least one American: Chrissy Teigen. Strangely enough, Republicans showed no interest in drilling down on this allegation of censorship.

☆ Ex-Twitter employee tells AOC the platform changed its content moderation policy to accommodate Trump's racist 'go back' tweets
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-08 | by ( Brent D. Griffiths | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A former top Twitter official said the social network bent its rules for Trump's 2019 racist tweet. "So much for bias against right-wing on Twitter," Ocasio-Cortez said, concluding the line of questioning. The recommendation had been for Trump's tweets to be labeled but allowed to remain on the platform since he was a public figure. Twitter was repeatedly criticized for allowing Trump's tweets to stand. Following the January 6, 2021 Capitol riot, the social network banned the president "due to the risk of further incitement of violence."

☆ Sen. Daines’s Twitter account suspended after posting profile picture of himself hunting
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-07 | by ( Brian Fung | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +2 min

Washington CNN —Twitter has suspended Montana Republican Sen. Steve Daines’s account for violations of the company’s sensitive media policy. Daines’ Twitter profile currently displays messages indicating that the account is “temporarily unavailable because it violates the Twitter Media Policy.”According to an aide to the senator, Daines’ account was suspended due to his profile picture, which had shown Daines and his wife posing while hunting. A separate campaign account for Daines with a different profile picture was unaffected. In a statement, Rachel Dumke, a spokesperson for Daine, called the suspension “preposterous” and said Twitter had informed Daines’ office that the suspension would last until the profile picture was removed. Daines’ profile picture had included an animal showing what appeared to be small flecks of blood on its coat, and that were difficult to discern without expanding the image.

☆ The FBI is investigating if George Santos scammed a military veteran by taking funds that were raised for his dying dog: report
▼ + stars: | 2023-02-02 | by ( Kelsey Vlamis | Cheryl Teh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Military veteran Rich Osthoff told Politico he was contacted by two FBI agents on Wednesday. Osthoff in January accused Santos of taking over $3,000 from a fundraiser meant for a dying dog. "I'm glad to get the ball rolling with the big-wigs," Osthoff told Politico. Osthoff told Patch Sapphire died in January 2017 after he could not afford to pay for her surgery. Santos told Steakin he has "no clue" about the DBI investigation, and has "never met" Osthoff.

☆ TikTok CEO to testify before Congress in March amid app security questions
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Rose Horowitch | Rose Horowitch Is An Intern With Nbc News Digital Politics. | ) www.nbcnews.com time to read: +3 min

TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew will appear before Congress in March to field questions about the viral video app's security measures amid mounting efforts to ban it because of privacy concerns. TikTok, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, has come under increased scrutiny after media reports showed possible security breaches. Several lawmakers are supporting legislation to ban the app from the U.S. entirely. The ban Biden approved, which was wrapped into the omnibus spending bill, included limited exceptions for law enforcement, national security and security research purposes. Last month Congress banned it on all government devices.

☆ A Twitter employee joked that they would write 'stay employed' for their Q3 goals after Elon Musk's takeover, report says
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-30 | by ( Kate Duffy | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A Twitter worker joked about how to stay employed after Elon Musk bought the firm, per a report. Some staff searched for any indication of layoffs on Musk's Twitter feed, the report said. In the wake of Musk's takeover of Twitter in late October, employees were concerned about job cuts at the company, The Verge reported, citing more than 24 current and former Twitter employees. Another employee replied, saying: "Writes, 'stay employed'," the report said. Since Musk took over Twitter, thousands of employees have either resigned or been fired or laid off, Insider's Kali Hays reported.

☆ Twitter research group stall complicates compliance with new EU law
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( Sheila Dang | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +7 min

Twitter signed a voluntary agreement in June with the EU related to the DSA committing to "empowering the research community" through means including sharing datasets about disinformation with researchers. The EU law would require platforms with over 45 million EU users to respond to EU-vetted researcher proposals. THE WORK OF THE CONSORTIUMThe research consortium was formed in response to backlash against Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Twitter had been preparing to disclose at least a dozen new datasets to researchers before then, the former employees said. If the research consortium is eliminated, "we will be returning to the 2017 era of limited shared communication about malicious state actor activity," said Renée DiResta, research manager at Stanford Internet Observatory.

☆ Twitter cofounder says Elon Musk has undone positive changes that were made to the platform before his takeover
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-27 | by ( Kate Duffy | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter cofounder Biz Stone said Elon Musk reversed positive changes on the site, per The Guardian. Stone said in the interview that Musk doesn't strike him as the right person to own Twitter. In an interview with The Guardian, Stone said he made advancements in morale and supervising content on Twitter after he rejoined the company in 2017. Twitter is experiencing financial difficulties, but Stone told The Guardian he thought the concept of the platform would survive. Twitter and representatives for Stone didn't immediately respond to Insider's request for comment made outside of normal US operating hours.

☆ A Google employee of 11 years says he and his wife stared at each other in 'disbelief' when they realized they'd both been laid off by the company
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-26 | by ( Sawdah Bhaimiya | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

A Google employee said he and his wife were both laid off by the tech giant in Friday's mass cull. Ashish Kalsi wrote on LinkedIn that they stared at each other in "disbelief" that morning as their daughter slept. Kalsi said he's on an H-1B visa and has a 60-day "countdown" to find a new role or leave the US. Kalsi wrote that his wife woke up at 6:30 a.m. to take a meeting at 7 a.m. but found that her work profile was missing and couldn't access internal resources on her laptop. "I checked my phone and everything looked normal, except that it wasn't," he wrote on LinkedIn.

☆ A Google recruiter says he discovered he'd lost his job after a call with one of his candidates suddenly disconnected
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-26 | by ( Grace Dean | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

A Google recruiter said he learned he'd lost his job after a call with one of his candidates disconnected. Laid-off Google staff have criticized the abrupt and impersonal manner in which they were terminated. Lanigan-Ryan had been working on contract for headhunter Morgan McKinley at Google's office in Dublin, Ireland, since November 2021. He said that although he was paid by Morgan McKinley, "for all intents and purposes, I was a Google team member." She then saw a pop-up on her laptop with information about severance and "immediately lost access to everything," she said.

☆ Twitter is down to fewer than 550 full-time engineers
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-20 | by ( Lora Kolodny | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +2 min

Twitter's full-time headcount has dwindled to approximately 1,300 employees, including fewer than 550 full-time engineers by title, according to internal records viewed by CNBC. Around 75 of the company's 1,300 employees are on leave including about 40 engineers. The company's trust and safety team, which makes policy recommendations, design and product changes with the aim of keeping all of Twitter's users safe, is down to fewer than 20 full-time employees. Before Musk led a $44 billion leveraged buyout of Twitter last year, Twitter's headcount stood at about 7,500 employees. Since taking over Twitter, Musk has faced a shareholder backlash at Tesla for being distracted, for stirring up political controversy with his strategy at Twitter, and for selling billions of dollars worth of his Tesla shares to finance his Twitter takeover.

☆ GoFundMe says it removed George Santos' fundraiser for a veteran's sick dog and banned Santos' email from the platform after he ghosted them
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Cheryl Teh | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

GoFundMe says it took down a 2016 fundraiser for a dying dog that was linked to George Santos. GoFundMe told Insider it has a "zero tolerance policy" for the misuse of its services. As first reported by Patch, a military veteran is accusing Santos of taking $3,000 worth of GoFundMe funds meant for the man's sick dog. The platform told Insider that it has a "zero tolerance policy" for misuse of its services. Rich Osthoff, a veteran who lives in New Jersey, is accusing Santos of pilfering the GoFundMe funds.

☆ Rep. George Santos pushes back on 'insane' reports he took funds for veteran's dying dog
▼ + stars: | 2023-01-19 | by ( Kevin Breuninger | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +6 min

"The reports that I would let a dog die is shocking & insane," the freshman lawmaker from New York tweeted Thursday morning. Santos' office did not immediately provide any of those photos when asked by CNBC. Santos then became elusive, and finally told Osthoff he had moved the money into his charity to use "for other dogs," the veteran told Patch. If Santos were to leave office, it would likely trigger a competitive special election in New York for his seat. Rep. Byron Donalds, R-Fla., made a similar argument Thursday when asked by CNN whether he believed Santos should resign.

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