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Facebook plans to hire 3,000 people over next year to monitor and remove videos depicting extreme violence

David Ingram
Reuters
Wed, 03 May 2017 16:32 UTC
Facebook logo
© Regis Duvignau / Reuters
Facebook Inc will hire 3,000 more people over the next year to respond to reports of inappropriate material on the social media network and speed up the removal of videos showing murder, suicide and other violent acts, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said on Wednesday.

The hiring spree is an acknowledgement by Facebook that, at least for now, it needs more than automated software to improve monitoring of posts. Facebook Live, a service that allows any user to broadcast live, has been marred since its launch last year by instances of people streaming violence.

Zuckerberg, the company's co-founder, said in a Facebook post the workers will be in addition to the 4,500 people who already review posts that may violate its terms of service.

Last week, a father in Thailand broadcast himself killing his daughter on Facebook Live, police said. After more than a day, and 370,000 views, Facebook removed the video. Other videos from places such as Chicago and Cleveland have also shocked viewers with their violence.
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V

Hundreds of Brazilian prison workers storm Ministry of Justice building to protest pension reforms


RT
Wed, 03 May 2017 16:25 UTC
brazil prison workers protest
© Ruptly
Nearly 500 Brazilian prison system workers took over the Ministry of Justice building in the capital, Brasilia, to protest the inclusion of correctional workers in the government's pension reforms, slated to raise the retirement age and reduce benefits.

The demonstrators, who had brought bottles of water and mattresses with them, stormed the building on Tuesday afternoon, saying they were ready to remain there until their demands were met. National Public Security Force agents surrounded the entrance and prevented other protesters from entering.

"We have just occupied the Justice Ministry. And we're going to be here until lawmakers take us out of their bill," France 24 cited the head of the Sao Paulo corrections union branch, Fabio Cesar Ferreira, as saying.

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Bug

Woman forced to flee house with baby after swarm of venomous spiders crawl out of banana


RT
Wed, 03 May 2017 16:19 UTC
spider
© imago stock&people / Global Look Press
A mother was forced to evacuate her house with her seven-month-old baby after hundreds of highly-venomous spiders crawled out of a banana she bought from supermarket giant Asda.

Gemma Price was forced to quit her home in Stanley, County Durham, while exterminators battled to deal with the creatures, some of which had crawled into her baby's crib.

Price, 30, said she had not noticed the spider egg sac on one of the Costa Rican bananas she had bought from the supermarket. "Next day I came home from the gym and picked one off from the bunch and went upstairs," Price said.

"As I peeled the banana a white egg sac, which I hadn't noticed before, broke and hundreds of little spiders were crawling on my hands and arms and down my pajamas," Price told the Northern Echo.
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Eye 1

Privacy group sues NYPD over refusing to disclose facial recognition program


RT
Wed, 03 May 2017 15:48 UTC
surveillance cameras
© David W Cerny / Reuters
A privacy group is suing the NYPD for documents related to their secretive and unregulated facial recognition program. They say the technology can misidentify people, causing innocent people to be investigated or arrested.

The Center on Privacy & Technology (CPT), a university think tank at Georgetown Law, announced Tuesday that it filed a Freedom of Information lawsuit against the New York Police Department (NYPD) after the department refused to disclose documents relating their long-term use of facial recognition technology.

Facial recognition technology uses algorithms to analyze images of human faces and match them with photos in a database containing such images as driver's license photos, passport photos, police records and even public photos posted to social media or dating sites.

In January, the Center on Privacy & Technology (CPT) filed a Free of Information Act (FIOA) request with the NYPD for records relating to their facial identification unit. In response, the NYPD sent the CPT a single memo on procedures relating to the technology. The department claims no other records could be found.

"The department's claim that it cannot find any records about its use of the technology is deeply troubling," said David Vladeck, the CPT's faculty director. "The NYPD has been using face recognition for over five years. New Yorkers have a right to know how it's using face recognition technology."
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Eye 2

Brigitte Bardot: 'You can see the total lack of empathy reflected in Macron's cold, steel eyes'

Victoria Friedman
Breitbart
Wed, 03 May 2017 15:45 UTC
Brigette Bardot
The French film icon Brigitte Bardot has urged her fellow countrymen not to vote for Emmanuel Macron in France's presidential election on Sunday, saying you can see his lack of compassion in "the coldness of his steel eyes".

The animal rights campaigner tweeted to her followers that they should not vote Macron, fearing the situation for animals would deteriorate under his presidency.

"The contempt he gives to animal suffering can be seen in the total lack of empathy reflected in the coldness of his steel eyes.

"Whilst the scandals are increasing, he takes the side of the animal breeders and the hunters against animal rights associations that are fighting with the lobbies that seem to have power over this candidate."

One of the best-known sex symbols of the 1950s and 1960s, Bardot came out as a supporter of populist candidate Marine Le Pen at the beginning of the year. In a wide-ranging interview with Le Figaro that touched upon cultural issues, Ms. Bardot was asked what she thought of contemporary culture.
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People 2

Almost two-thirds of Russians support a Le Pen presidency in France


RT
Wed, 03 May 2017 15:32 UTC
le pen
© Alexei Druzhinin / Sputnik
Almost two-thirds of Russians support Marine Le Pen in the current French presidential campaign, with just 8 percent preferring Emmanuel Macron as the next leader of France.

According to a recent poll conducted by Russian state-run sociological agency VTSIOM, half of all Russians are following the events of the current French presidential elections.

Just over half - 57 percent - think that the outcome of the race is important for Russia, while about 30 percent believe that the poll results will not affect their country in any significant way.
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Biohazard

Airline crews increasingly getting sick from toxic fumes in cabin air

Tom Regan
WSB-TV
Tue, 02 May 2017 15:23 UTC
airplane interior
Channel 2 Action News has learned three airline crews in Atlanta in the past year had emergency medical care after they say fumes on board their planes made them sick.

The director of Georgia's Poison Center told Channel 2's Tom Regan the agency received emergency calls three different times in the past year about flight crews falling ill at Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

The jet engines that take you into the air, also draw in the air you breathe.

Despite filters, that air sometimes contains invisible fumes that can sicken crews, drawing an emergency response at airports in other cities and here in Atlanta.

Dr. Gaylord Lopez of the Georgia Poison Control Center told Regan, "We had 13 patients exposed over the past year related to airplane fumes."
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Health

UN humanitarian convoy backed by Russian Army delivers 51 aid trucks to Syrian Gouta


Sputnik
Wed, 03 May 2017 15:13 UTC
relief workers unload humanitarian aid
© REUTERS/ Bassam Khabieh
A joint humanitarian convoy of the UN, the International Committee of the Red Cross and the Syrian Arab Red Crescent of 51 trucks, supported by the Russian military, delivered aid to the Syrian East Gouta, Russia's envoy to the UN Geneva Office Alexey Borodavkin told Sputnik on Wednesday.

The convoy accompanied by the Russian military provided assistance to 35,000 people.

"The Russian side is doing its utmost to ensure that the Syrian civilians receive humanitarian aid, including, from the UN, regularly," Borodavkin said.
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Dominoes

Top immigration group ALIPAC rescinds endorsement of Trump over failed immigration promises

Jim Hoft
The Gateway Pundit
Tue, 02 May 2017 15:12 UTC
trump immigration
Speaker Paul Ryan and House Republicans are set to pass legislation this week that forbids President Trump from using federal funds from the May 2017 budget on his proposed border wall.

After several broken promises on immigration ALIPAC withdrew its endorsement of President Trump on Tuesday.
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Handcuffs

Cop caught on video killing Walter Scott in cold blood reaches plea deal, likely avoids life in jail

Matt Agorist
The Free Thought Project
Tue, 02 May 2017 15:02 UTC
walter scott
In December the trial of Michael Slager, who shot and killed Walter Scott in the back as he ran away — on video — tragically ended in a mistrial. Now, in what will likely be another travesty of justice, the officer has reached a plea deal and is expected to plead guilty in federal court on Tuesday.

Slager, who murdered a man over a tail light infraction, was facing both federal civil rights and state murder charges in connection with the killing of Walter Scott in April of 2015. Scott, 50, was unarmed and running away when he was killed.

According to NBC News, after the mistrial in December, state prosecutors in South Carolina said they would seek to try Michael Slager again, but no charges had yet been filed.

That means that if this plea goes as proposed, Slager's guilty plea on the remaining federal charges would be the end of all the criminal cases, and the state would not seek to try him again, NBC reports.
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