This week MSNBC published an opinion piece from a researcher on China (who works on internet censorship and freedom of expression issues) from the advocacy group Human Rights Watch.
It examines specific exchanges between a China-based Zoom executive and employees at the company’s California headquarters (taken from the 47-page complaint filed by America’s Justice Department) showing how Zoom disrupted video meetings commemorating the anniversary of the Tiananmen Square crackdown:

It was a fascinating read, not least because few global tech companies that do business in China have ever made public the details of their communications with Chinese authorities on censorship issues, despite repeated calls to do so from human rights organizations and United Nations experts. What the complaint reveals is Beijing’s aggressive pursuit of global censorship of topics deemed sensitive or critical of Beijing, and Zoom’s failure to adequately protect its users’ rights to free expression and privacy…

Beijing has long leveraged market access to compel foreign tech companies to meet its censorship demands, whether in China or abroad. Apple has removed hundreds of virtual private network (VPN) apps from China’s App Store. In 2019, it also removed a mapping app widely used by pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong from the App Store. LinkedIn blocked content critical of Chinese authorities for users in China. From the complaint, one can see Zoom’s fear that if it didn’t terminate meetings or suspend accounts upon request, it risked having its China operation shut down at any time, which loomed large in all of its decisions.

Companies understandably want access to China’s huge market, but they also have a responsibility to respect human rights under the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights. Zoom said publicly that it is “dedicated to the free and open exchange of ideas,” but when Jin repeatedly framed speech critical of the Chinese government as something that could “do bad things” or “illegal activities,” and demanded they be censored, he met no resistance or got any questions from his colleagues at headquarters.

The article also blames Jin for making false claims to a Zoom colleague that a private Tiananmen commemoration meeting was supporting terrorism/inciting violence, after which “the colleague quickly terminated the meeting and suspended the host account without any investigation into the matter.”

And it alleges that Jin also forwarded complaints from operatives who’d intentionally joined public meetings with offending content so those meetings could then be reported and shut down, while “a U.S.-based Zoom employee, knowing they were schemes, facilitated it…”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – Are Tech Companies Censoring Their Users For Access to China’s Market?

Engadget reports:
Electrek notes that Tesla has released its promised holiday update, and the centerpiece appears to be a Boombox mode that pumps media outside as long as you have a recent-enough EV with a pedestrian speaker system, like later Model 3 production runs…
Other updates include a smarter Scheduled Departure that preconditions the battery and cabin without plugging in, larger driving visualizations (helpful for Autopilot) and at-a-glance views of the number of open stalls at Superchargers.
Electrek’s report highlights some additional features:
Earlier this week, we reported that it included 3 new in-car video games, but we now have the full release notes with all the details… “You can also customize the sound that your car makes when you press the horn, drive the car or when your car is moving with Summon. Select an option from the dropdown menu or insert your own USB device and save up to five custom sounds.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – Tesla Update Turns Cars into Boomboxes, Adds Three In-Car Videogames and Customizable Honking

“Edmund M. Clarke, the FORE Systems Professor of Computer Science Emeritus at Carnegie Mellon University, has died of Covid-19,” writes Slashdot reader McGruber.

From the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette:

Professor Clarke was best known for his work in model checking, an automated method for detecting design errors in computer hardware and software. CMU president Farnam Jahanian said the world had “lost a giant in computer science” with Mr. Clarke’s death. “Ed’s pioneering work in model checking applied formal computational methods to the ultimate challenge: computers checking their own correctness,” Mr. Jahanian said in a statement. “As systems become ever more complex, we are just beginning to see the wide-reaching and long-term benefits of Ed’s insights, which will continue to inspire researchers and practitioners for years to come.”

In the early 1980s, Mr. Clarke and his Harvard University graduate student, E. Allen Emerson — as well as Joseph Sifakis of the University of Grenoble, who was working separately — developed model checking, which has helped to improve the reliability of complex computer chips, systems and networks. For their work, the Association for Computing Machinery gave the three scientists the prestigious A.M. Turing Award — computer science’s Nobel Prize — in 2007.

Mr. Clark’s citation on the Turing Award website said Microsoft and Intel and other companies use model checking to verify designs for computer networks and software. “It is becoming particularly important in the verification of software designed for recent generations of integrated circuits, which feature multiple processors running simultaneously,” the citation page said. “Model checking has substantially improved the reliability and safety of the systems upon which modern life depends.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – Edmund Clarke, 2007 Winner of the Turing Award, Dies of Covid-19

In October, Edward Snowden was granted permanent residency in Russia. A new web page by the EFF applauds his past activities as a U.S. whistleblower. “His revelations about secret surveillance programs opened the world’s eyes to a new level of government misconduct, and reinvigorated EFF’s continuing work in the courts and with lawmakers to end unlawful mass spying.” And then they shared this fund-raising pitch written by Edward Snowden:

Seven years ago I did something that would change my life and alter the world’s relationship to surveillance forever.

When journalists revealed the truth about state deception and illegal conduct against citizens, it was human rights and civil liberties groups like EFF — backed by people around the world just like you — that seized the opportunity to hold authority to account.

Surveillance quiets resistance and takes away our choices. It robs us of private space, eroding our dignity and the things that make us human. When you’re secure from the spectre of judgement, you have room to think, to feel, and to make mistakes as your authentic self. That’s where you test your notions of what’s right. That’s when you question the things that are wrong.

By sounding the alarm and shining a light on mass surveillance, we force governments around the world to confront their wrongdoing.

Slowly, but surely, grassroots work is changing the future. Laws like the USA Freedom Act have just begun to rein in excesses of government surveillance. Network operators and engineers are triumphantly “encrypting all the things” to harden the Internet against spying. Policymakers began holding digital privacy up to the light of human rights law. And we’re all beginning to understand the power of our voices online.

This is how we can fix a broken system. But it only works with your help.

For 30 years, EFF members have joined forces to ensure that technology supports freedom, justice, and innovation for all people. It takes unique expertise in the courts, with policymakers, and on technology to fight digital authoritarianism, and thankfully EFF brings all of those skills to the fight. EFF relies on participation from you to keep pushing the digital rights movement forward

. Each of us plays a crucial role in advancing democracy for ourselves, our neighbors, and our children. I hope you’ll answer the call by joining EFF to build a better digital future together.

Sincerely, Edward Snowden

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – Edward Snowden Urges Donations to the EFF

Mashable reports:

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency showed off a collection of samples from the asteroid Ryugu on Thursday following the return of the Hayabusa2 probe.
The black, gravelly samples from Ryugu contain a whole bunch of small chips collected from the asteroid’s subsurface…
Normally, space rocks like these are collected after they enter Earth’s atmosphere at surface-scorching speeds. These samples from Ryugu are the first ever that can be examined without being damaged during entry, which is key to getting a clear look at and better understanding these celestial rocks, according to a report from NPR.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – Samples from Ryugu Asteroid Revealed After Delivery to Earth

Long-time Slashdot reader fahrbot-bot summarizes an article from LiveScience: There’s a giant asteroid somewhere out in the solar system, and it hurled a big rock at Earth.

The evidence for this mystery space rock comes from a diamond-studded meteor that exploded over Sudan in 2008.

NASA had spotted the 9-ton (8,200 kilograms), 13-foot (4 meters) meteor heading toward the planet well before impact, and researchers showed up in the Sudanese desert to collect an unusually rich haul of remains. Now, a new study of one of those meteorites suggests that the meteor may have broken off of a giant asteroid — one more or less the size of the dwarf planet Ceres, the largest object in the asteroid belt — that formed in the presence of water under intermediate temperatures and pressures.

The mineral makeup of these space rocks offers clues about the “parent asteroid” that birthed a given meteor, researchers said in a statement.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Source: Slashdot – An Asteroid the Size of a Dwarf Planet Is Lurking In Our Solar System