Snapchat will let users share real-time location with friends

  • Snapchat announced they will introduce real-time location sharing on the app, in partnership with the Its On US programme.
  • This feature is meant to be used as ‘temporary buddy system’ for friends and family when they are travelling.
  • Users can choose to enable the feature for a selected mutual friend for 15 minutes or a few hours – the feature is off by default and can’t be enabled for all friends.
  • You can read the full story on The Verge’s website.

Nine tech firms under investigation for endangering children online

  • Nine firms are under investigation by the Information Commissioner Office (ICO) for breaches of the Children’s Code after complaints from the charity 5Rights.
  • The firms contacted include Instagram, Apple, Google and Omegle.
  • The investigation is focused on the potentially “poor compliance with privacy requirements” which have posed “a high risk to children”.
  • You can read the full story on the Telegraph’s website.

Alcohol addiction treatment cuts and increase in parents’ heavy drinking

 

  • An all-party parliamentary group has found that heavy drinking has increased during the COVID-19 pandemic despite funding cuts and less referrals to addiction services.
  • An estimated 2.6 million children in the UK are living with at least one parent that drinks too much.
  • Around 65% of drug and alcohol services had their funding cut or not increased and 57% of councils don’t have a strategy to support children of alcoholics.
  • You can read the full story on the Sky News

Ministers to reject making misogyny a hate crime in England and Wales

  • Ministers will reject making misogyny a crime in England and Wales in response to calls for an extension for hate crimes to cover misogyny.
  • Its rejection is based on recommendation that the extension would prove “more harmful than helpful” to victims of violence against women and girls.
  • The government is also “carefully considering” a new offence of street harassment that would criminalise verbal abuse of women and girls, pestering and persistent catcalling.
  • You can read the full story on the Guardian’s website.