Campaigners Fear TikTok May Cause Eating Disorders
- Campaigners have suggested that the social media app TikTok could encourage unhealthy relationships with food and trigger people who have suffered eating disorders,.
- The video app is one of the most popular in the world, with more than 800m users – 41% of those users between the age of 16 and 24.
- Eating disorder charity Beat said that, while it supports the action TikTok has taken to reduce the spread of harmful content, there are still some harmful videos on the app. The charity fears that some of the content glamorises eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia.
- “We’d advocate for real people to actually search the platform and to highlight and take down the harmful content,” Tom Quinn, Director of External Affairs, said.
App Leads Group of Young People to Dead Body
- A TikTok user shared a video which showed the moment he and his friends found a dead body inside a suitcase washed up on a beach in Seattle. The user explained that they found the bag whose smell was ‘overwhelming’, prompting them to call the police.
- The young people said they found the suitcase after being sent to the spot by Randonautica, an app which generates random coordinates for users to follow based on their intentions.
- The Local Police Force confirmed on Saturday they had found several bags containing human remains in West Seattle. An investigation has since been launched, and detectives are working with the King County Medical Examiner’s Office.
Outdoor Brands Join Boycott of Facebook
- Outdoor brands The North Face, Patagonia and Rei have pulled their advertising from Facebook platforms as part of the ‘Stop Hate For Profits campaign,’ which is calling on brands to join the boycott during the month of July.
- The North Face said it was halting ads “until stricter policies are put in place to stop racist, violent or hateful content and misinformation from circulating on the platform.” Patagonia said it would also be joining the boycott until “at least the end of July”.
- In a long post, published on Sunday, Facebook said it was committed to “advancing equity and racial justice…we’re taking steps to review our policies, ensure diversity and transparency when making decisions on how we apply our policies, and advance racial justice and voter engagement on our platform.”
Charity Warns That Number of Children Needing Foster Care is Soaring
- Leading children’s charity Barnardos has said the number of children needing foster care has risen by 44% during the coronavirus pandemic, creating a “state of emergency”. The number of people looking to become foster carers has fallen by almost half over the same period, Barnardo’s added.
- There were 2,349 referrals to the charity‘s fostering services between 1 March and 23 April this year in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, up from 1,629 in the same period in 2019.
- Just 161 people inquired about becoming a foster carer during the two months, down 47% from 302 across the same period in 2019.
- Barnardo’s chief executive, Javed Khan, said: “The coronavirus pandemic has hit vulnerable families the hardest, with many reaching crisis point. This has created a state of emergency, as more children than ever need a safe and loving foster family, while fewer adults are coming forward as potential foster carers.”
Business Users on Twitter Alerted to Billing Information Leak
- Twitter has sent a message directly to business users of the platform to report a serious data breach while using its advertisement and analytics platform.
- The breach has meant that prior to May 20, 2020 certain details would be stored within a web browser’s cache. Web cache is whereby documents or information of the pages a user has visited are stored on the web browser.
- In a message sent to business owners, Twitter said: “We are writing to let you know of a data security incident that may have involved your personal information on ads.twitter and analytics.twitter.”
- Examples of information leaked include, email address, phone number, last four digits of credit card numbers.
- Twitter has been updated to stop this from happening further, but is requesting users who share computers to clear their browser cache when they log out.
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